


Fólkvangr

by moonlightavenger



Category: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drama, Gen, Gore, Sex, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-23
Packaged: 2021-03-24 05:55:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 35,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30067704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonlightavenger/pseuds/moonlightavenger
Summary: Gilda, as many other griffons, had heard of The Lion, but also like many other griffons she didn’t bother with him. Chancellor, King… It didn’t matter. In the end whoever ended ruling the griffons would be the same: just another name with boring speeches and taxes with different names, especially because Celestia had the whole world under her wings.What mattered was that the ponies had some nice ideas that stuck with the griffons. Because of those she could pursue her little passion of baking scones and even with the current unrest and political issues, her life was under control and pleasant enough.Then she found herself in trouble and, despite doing her best, it was not enough. Things didn’t go as planned and she found herself flung into a journey into the past of her race and the conflict in its future.
Relationships: Gilda (My Little Pony)/Original Character(s)
Kudos: 1





	1. Behind Invisible Silver Bars Nowhere

It was a nice day in Griffonstone. Hot as all heck, as it usually was, and wet. Never a good combination, but also one that was almost always present, unless it was wet and cold which usually happened when the ponies pulled out of their flanks that they needed some rain.

Griffons preferred neither and both left them in a bad mood anyways.

Not that Gilda had the privilege of being bothered by the weather. It was not like she had a choice to begin with and those scones wouldn’t sell themselves.

She had a nice little raw wood stand in the square with the hospital, some state-owned buildings and King Grover’s statue. The it was polished, but not varnished and she made sure that the nails were a nice detail, polished and shiny. Other than having a nice and well-made stand, the square seemed like a good place to open it, since a lot of griffons went there and there were also some ponies that worked in the hospital and sweets had a tendency of selling rather well where ponies went.

There were other stands and some stores by the streets that surrounded the plaza, of course, but they were hardly any competition as they were serious businesses such as the hospital itself, a blacksmith, the woodworker that built her stand for her. Correction… The woodworker she hired for that. Few did things for free anymore. Gilda sold snacks and they didn’t bother with her.

Regardless of what other griffons said, her business was serious too. She had some trouble remembering that, though. It is just that she liked baking the damn things, not spending the whole feathering day sitting her ass in the heat staring at that asshole in the statue and trying to get griffons to buy her scones.

One Bit for one. Three Bits for five wasn’t that bad a deal. She was sure they were tasty because they did sell. At least enough to sustain her, but not much more, in those annoying times of chancellors being removed and kings being crowned. It seemed like an eternity since the last drama that took over griffon society and she was too young to remember.

It was a quiet day, probably because of the heat, but she managed to sell a few scones to ponies and griffons that worked in the hospital and the mayor’s office. Sitting there was the worst though. She felt like she could be doing something fun, or productive like more scones to sell, but if she left the stand alone, they would steal her produce… That wasn’t Ponyville where one could go somewhere else, and costumers would pay for what they took.

“Hiya, Gilda!” Suddenly, a friendly face and a greeting.

“Hey, Greta. What’s up?” She waved back.

“Oh, nothing much!” The green-faced griffoness sat next to her and sniffed at the small pile of scones. “One of our suppliers simply stopped talking to us. My boss asked me to see what was going on and I just came back from Longbeach. Turns out the guy left his mate and cubs and just went North. Can you believe?”

“Wow. What a dick. I mean, I’m not one for marriage and stuff, but it seems like a real dick move to up and leave out of the blue.”

“Tell me about it!” Greta left a pair of Bits on the stand and scooped up two of the sweets. Gilda was always relieved that Greta always paid full and didn’t ask for a discount or something because she didn’t think she’d be able to say no, and she couldn’t afford it. Besides, Greta looked like she was doing well enough. “We lost a lot of costumers because of that. We just couldn’t meet the demand! Not to mention that prices are soaring, and nobody really needs perfume.”

Or, maybe not, and she was just a good friend. Either way Gilda picked up the Bits and threw them inside the small leather pouch across her chest.

“Yeah, I feel you guys. It seems that I can buy less and less with the profit from the scones every week. Everything is too expensive right now.”

Greta nodded emphatically while she munched on a scone. “How are you holding up though? I mean… I know you don’t really make a lot from the scones.”

“Well, it’s not great.” Good thing it was Greta and not Rainbow Dash. Gilda would never have managed to admit she was struggling to Dash. “I can survive, but it’s not fun anymore since they docked my income.”

“This is awful! I hear that griffon representatives in Canterlot are wasting a lot of time debating The Lion all the while griffon holds are splitting to one side or the other and major cities are going nuts. And the Chancellor does things like ending basic income. They even say there’s going to be a war! I wish Princess Celestia would get this sorted already.”

“Yeah… Not only they took my money, but I can’t sell past nighttime because the damn curfew. These things sold better at night when griffons and ponies in the hospital came and bought them by the boxes for the nightshift.”

“Hum… I would offer you a place at my job…” Greta said sheepishly, touching her fingers together, all meek and shy. “But, you remember, right?”

“Yeah…” Gilda’s paw brushed her head feathers. “It wasn’t your fault. Your boss and my personality didn’t work out.”

“Will you be okay, though?” Greta went on. “I can help, you know.”

“Geez, Greta!” Gilda grimaced and recoiled a bit. “It’s not like I’m going broke or something. I can live by myself!”

“Okay, alright.” Her friend put her paws apologetically. “I just want you to know that if you need, I’m here for you. Alright?”

“Yeah. Thanks.” Gilda did her best not to show, but she had the impression that Greta saw right through her though exterior. Thank goodness it wasn’t Rainbow Dash.

She waved to see her friend off and turned for a second, and on the following one she turned back to her stand some skinny dipshit with piss-yellow fur and brown feathers on his white head was eating two of her scones at once.

“That’s two Bits, dude.”

“Ech…” He put out his tongue. “They aren’t worth half of that!”

“You just ate two of them, jackass.” She snarled. “Two Bits or the next thing you’ll eat is your beak!”

“No!” He stared. “I’ll pay one if you add another. These things are disgusting.”

In her defense she didn’t say the things she thought of saying to that griffon. She did punch his face though. With a satisfying yelp and crunchy sound. He reeled and held his face, which brought her some measure of satisfaction until she saw the blood. Then she realized that actually making griffons swallow their beaks was not a good idea.

“Crap.” She grimaced and tried to touch him, but he pulled back and cried some more. “That! That was your fault!”

Then someone approached her. “Ma’am, did you just punch his beak in?”

Her luck being what it was, that was a black and white griffon wearing the Griffonstone Local Militia leather barding, complete with a wheellock pistol and a magical stun baton, accompanied by a tan and white female of the same institution. Fortunately, she restrained her first impulse of swearing. “He… He didn’t want to pay! He’s stealing from me!”

“That is for the judge to decide, ma’am. You have to come with me.” Said the female while the other went to calm and examine the ‘victim’.

“But the stand! I can’t leave it alone!”

“Not my problem, ma’am. My partner is gonna take him to the hospital and write down his testimony. You come with me and don’t make this any harder than it has to be. You may be restituted for your losses, but again, that is with the judge.”

Arguing looked like it was going to put her into more trouble, so she relented and walked with the griffoness. At least she didn’t tie her wings or something. And the day looked like it was going to be at least okay-ish.  
***

Spending the rest of the day and the night in the feathering prison was going to be lame, to say the least, but she was very grateful they would at least put her in a separated cell because the very though Gilda wouldn’t like, at all, to spend the night with the individuals she saw in the other cells.

After ‘processing’ where they took ages asking her stuff like her age and other more private questions she didn’t feel like repeating to herself another female militiagriffon shoved her into a cell with two other female adults. It had cots on the wall with pillows and blankets where she supposed she ought to sleep. It was her first time in a place like that. Surprisingly.

“Behave.” The griffon growled while she closed the bars.

Gilda sat and looked at the others. One was about her age with purple plumage in her face and the other was older, with yellow feathers. Both tan-colored, though and the first laid on her back on her cot, looking bored and the other sat on the floor, looking at Gilda.

“Uh…” She started.

“Shut your beak, new blood.” Purple one said. “Nobody cares.”

The other giggled and signaled for Gilda to come closer. “Don’t mind her. She’s just angry she didn’t get to keep the stuff she stole.”

“So, uh… Come here often?” Gilda mumbled coming closer, and what was wrong with her? What a dumbass thing to say! Fortunately, the other just giggled again.

“First time in the slammer?” She asked with a smug grin.

“Yeah… Uh… I’m Gilda.”

“I’m Gertrude.” She grinned warmly. “Moody one over there is Grizelda.”

“Hi.” Gilda didn’t know what to do with her paws, so they kept shuffling nervously one over the other while she sat and her eyes shifted from one to the other as though they might jump at her any second. 

Gertrude waved a paw at Gilda as though she could read her mind. “Don’t worry. They’ll keep you here while they prepare a folder with your case and sent it to the judge. If you were really in trouble, you’d be with the others.”

“So…” Gilda said slowly, trying to pick up her thoughts.

“I know dearie.” Gertrude grinned again. “You wanna ask the question everyone sees in the books and theaters and that no one actually asks in real life. Go right ahead. Get that out of your system.”

Way to get her feeling like a damn child. She chuckled and asked anyway. “What are you in for?”

Gertrude giggled. “We’re prostitutes, honey. Well, she’s in for stealing… I’m here just because the Chancellor decided that prostitution was a ‘moral crime’. Whatever that means.”

“That is not a crime, though… As far as I know.” Gilda’s eyebrow rose.

“It’s not.” Gertrude shrugged. “But my politically savvy friends tell me the Chancellor is trying to pretend he has some moral high-ground with all the support he lost.”

“Yeah…” Grizelda chuckled sarcastically from her cot. “Let me steal money from the people and then pretend I’m the good guy by putting them in the jail. Fucking dumbass. The only reason I’m doing this is because he shoved my pay under his tail.”

Before Gilda could ask, Gertrude explained. “We’re actresses… But uh… It’s been hard finding a job since we had a small troupe… Nothing like the big theaters in Manehattan or Canterlot. We dissolved because no one was going to our show, bills started pilling up and we were kinda left without an option when they shot down the basic income... A friend of mine introduced me to the… Uh… Community.”

Gilda took too long to notice her beak hanged from her mouth. Gertrude seemed like she was nice enough, but she soon she realized that the notion the same could happen to her horrified the feathers out of her. Just the notion of some random guy like that asshole in the square touching her and pretending that she liked almost made her lunch spill out of her.

Fortunately, Grizelda wasn’t paying attention and Gertrude didn’t take any offense and it made it even worse because Gilda could easily imagine she had gone through the same process she imagined for herself!

“So, what do you do for a living, Gilda?” She asked with such a sweet smile.

Gilda hesitated a little. Her first reaction would’ve been to push the griffoness and tell her that she’s not going the same path. Like, ever! But she contained herself. “I bake. Scones. I sell them near the hospital.”

“Oh! That sounds great!” Gertrude held her paws all happiness.

“Hey! I think I know you!” Grizelda suddenly sat at her cot. “I ate your scones once. They were good enough.”

“Gee. Thanks.”

“What? I said they were good.” She shrugged. “How did selling scones get you here? Did they come up with a license or some shit like that?”

“I punched a guy because he didn’t want to pay.”

“Feh.” She came closer to Gilda and Gertrude. “Such a pony thing. You can’t even defend your own stuff. Sometimes I wish we weren’t together.”

Gilda agreed and for some stupid reason the younger griffon’s acceptance made her feel a little bit better. Gertrude pushed her shoulder. “You sound like one of those griffons from the north that you hate.”

“Heck no!” She shook her head violently. “I wouldn’t bite that hook if it came with a nice beach home and some dumbass to pay for my expensive tastes.”

The other sighed. “I don’t know. My ex went there and hasn’t come back.”

“Maybe he died…”

“No… He is though! Maybe everything would’ve been different if I had gone with him.”

“Yeah, sure…” Grizelda sat and crossed her forelimbs. “I can definitively imagine those boors treating nicely a pair of hookers from the ‘degenerate south’.”

“Well, we weren’t back then.” Her gaze fell. “I hope he is okay. I mean… It is a long distance.”

“Nah. You wish he would come back to rescue you…” She other scowled.

“Huh… It seems as though everyone knows someone that made the trip to the North.” Gilda mused. “Why didn’t you go with your guy?”

“I was scared and had my job. I tried talking to them later, but they weren’t interested in helping me. I guess I’m not good enough…”

“What even is up there? Some sort of lost griffon paradise?”

“Something like that!” Gertrude grinned and closed her paws all excited again. “It’s where the future king of the griffons lives. It’s gotta be a paradise! Must be such an awesome dude too! All badass northerner griffon. Maybe he’s the tough silent type! I mean… They call him ‘The Lion’! How cool is that? Or maybe he has a surprisingly easy going, suave thing going on!”

“Most likely a dick with too high an opinion of himself and about as corrupt as Silkfeathers. For real, girl? We know enough guys to know that the ‘king’ you’re imagining doesn’t exist!”

“You’re just bitter you never found one for yourself!”

“Yeah… Because you did. He just left you behind…”

Gilda sighed as quietly as she managed while the two argued. It was going to be a long wait.  
***

She passed the night with the two hookers and for some reason she didn’t really understand they called her first. The same griffon militia lady that brought her in took her to an office where a big griffon gal, all white and dark-gray with sharp green eyes sat behind a large and exquisitely carved wooden table with all sorts of diplomas and such on the wall behind her. She even had a small pair of glasses to make her even more stern. 

“Gilda?” The judge asked and she took a second to reply, enough that her eyes rose from the paper she was holding and almost froze Gilda’s gut.

“Yes! Sorry!”

“You’ve been charged with aggravated assault of a minor. Witnessed by two officers of the local militia. You see, I have your file here with me. Unicorn efficiency at its finest. So, tell me what happened and don’t try to spin me a sad story.”

Wait! Fuck! Minor?! How old was he? Seventeen? What a joke!

“He didn’t want to pay two Bits for the scones he ate!” Gilda immediately blurted out without thinking, that jackass was so clearly in the wrong and the whole thing was so obviously a mistake that she couldn’t see even the intimidating judge telling her otherwise!

“You assaulted and injured a minor over two Bits?” she scowled in a way that made Gilda’s innards turn.

Fuck! “I didn’t know he was a minor! He’s way too tall!”

“Punching griffons in the face is never a good idea, unless you want to visit me.”

“I!” She breathed once and held her tendency to snap back at others. “Yes. You’re right, ma’am. Your honor.”

“The mother wanted to press charges against you, but I talked to them and convinced his father that it wouldn’t make a difference to them and that you were in enough trouble with me.”

She really didn’t know if she should be thankful, but kept her beak shut despite her anxious eyes.

“Now, by Royal Law you will attend to an anger management course and you have three options: a two-thousand Bits fine, one month in a correctional facility or two months of community service. I believe your choice should be obvious, but the law obligates me to inform you that you do have the right to appeal to the Royal Court.”

“Chances are you’ll be sent to the Mid-Day Court, and in that case Princess Celestia is likely to repay you your two Bits and send you to Shatteredrock, because that is what she does to ‘dangerous’ griffons. Or worse, if your case is sent to Princess Twilight Sparkle, considering you are who you are and who you are friends with, you may end up starting a war already. So, you see, your choice should indeed be obvious.”

It sure was, she just didn’t like it! She didn’t have the money to pay, nor could she get it. She simply wouldn’t spend a month in a freaking jail! And she was loath of doing community service, but it was the only one she could afford, considering the judge had just scared the feathers out of her with the other options.

“I’ll be honest with you Gilda.” She removed her glasses and her stare made Gilda feel smaller than a tiny rat from the other side of her huge table. “I am only doing this for you because I have never seen you here, and you strike me as a good griffon, merely one in need of guidance. I understand that you are struggling in the current situation.”

Supposedly she was helping. Yikes. Though Gilda could imagine the sort of trouble she’d be in if the parents insisted on pressing charges against her. She just didn’t feel very helped, though.

The judge picked up the paper and squinted at it for a bit before staring at Gilda again. “Yes, it seems to me that you are trying your best, unlike certain other griffons. If that wasn’t the case, I would send you to prison. Assaulting a minor is a grisly crime anywhere.”

Did she mean those two she had shared her cell with? Poor girls, but she was too busy being scared for herself to be worried with others.

The white griffon put her glasses back on. “Understand that you are under probation, and in your current situation you cannot take loans or acquire any sort of new property, and you can expect that any legal procedure will take longer than expected until you have fulfilled your period under supervision. A young griffon in your situation ought to keep to themselves and avoid trouble at every opportunity.”

Finally, she wrote something on the paper she was holding with a quill and handed Gilda a small paper which she held on a paw. “You may go, now. Stay out of trouble and behave in your community service. You are expected in the city hall in the first hour tomorrow to choose your position.”

With that she simply turned her attention to the next paper in the pile on her table and Gilda wondered if she had just been incredibly lucky or if she never really was given a choice. She thought of asking a restitution for the money she lost with the abandoned stand, but she was too scared. She didn’t think for very long because the griffon officer with her dragged her out of the room and out the local militia headquarters.

“Seriously, stay out of trouble. We got enough as it is.” Then she closed the door and Gilda found herself in the not quite rich, but also not really poor part of the city. There were a few houses around the street and a few griffons walking around minding their own business or staring at her. Fortunately, none she knew. At least they gave back her pouch which she slung over her neck and then stored the folder the judge had given her. Also, Greta’s money was still there.

She smiled awkwardly to the passersby and flew away, towards the plaza with King Grover’s statue and her stand, that hopefully would still be there. She didn’t dare hope the scones or any money would, however.

A short flight was all it took until she arrived flying over the buildings and she did see her stand. She also saw a fat dark-brown and yellow griffoness standing next to her stand and tapping her forepaw on the beaten dirty path like she was impatiently waiting for something. And, of course, right next to her was the damn ‘minor’ who she ‘assaulted’ with an ugly dressing over his beak.

Oh man…

Landing next to the stand, followed by summarily ignoring the other two griffons was relatively easy. Not finding the scones she had left and not a single Bit hurt quite a bit. She started folding the stand and that griffoness’s paw tapping the ground pissed her off.

“What?!”

“Do you, young lady even understand the damage you caused to my little boy?”

Yes, you fat fuck! I caved his beak in! He deserved it. That dipshit was so big he couldn’t be that young! What? Was he seventeen? Certainly, big enough to steal, the piece of shit! She sighed and swallowed her thoughts. “Yes, ma’am. I am sorry. I didn’t want to hurt him, but I really needed the money from those scones he took.”

“Well, I bet you do!” She huffed all petulant at Gilda who took a step back. “Judge Gracey told us the sort of vagrant you are!”

That griffon didn’t look like a Gracey at all. Also, what the hell? But she wheezed angrily on before Gilda gathered her wits. “You are one of these good for nothing ‘basic income types’ that want nothing good to do with life! You should be ashamed!”

Wait! What?

“I hope you remember what you did. Just because my mate didn’t want to put you in your place, it doesn’t mean that I am not going to destroy your life!”

“Yeah! Destroy your shitty life.” The ‘minor’ added.

It was good thing that Gilda was stunned by all that because she would certainly have to see Judge Gracey again if she had managed to react in time before the fat jerk took off with her ‘little boy’.

“Just… What the hell?!” She roared and punched her stand hard enough to make it topple over and then cried before pulling it up again. Fortunately, it wasn’t damaged.

“You okay there, ma’am?” The militia griffon from last day, the male one, came near her, from where she didn’t even know.

“What? Am I under arrest now for punching my stand?” She immediately regretted what she said. Fortunately, the worst she got were the weird stares from the passersby and the griffon calmly waiting for her to calm herself. “Sorry. Rough day.”

“I’ll bet.” He seemed genuinely worried. “I didn’t like what I did… It was obvious the kid was in the wrong… But… You know. The judge is my mom and… ‘This job grows character'.”

Huh… Maybe he is the griffon that should be trying harder. Yikes. “Yeah. I know. Thanks anyway.”

“It’s Gilda, right?” He watched while she finished folding her stand.

“Yeah.”

“You should move to another city.” She stared dumbly at him. “You don’t know who those were, do you?”

She shook her head, still staring dumbly at him.

“Those are the mayor’s wife and their kid. Mom washed her paws of your troubles and left you to fend for yourself.”

Just great. Still, she didn’t even know what to say to that.

“Be careful.” The griffon said and moved away.

Move out of town? Easier said than done! She didn’t even have the money for a small vacation within Griffonstone. Crap! All he did was make her feel paranoid!

Alright, Gilda. Chill. 

She didn’t feel in the zone to think about stuff like that. Better to just go home and figure things out with a clearer head. It probably wasn’t that bad anyways. What would they do? It wasn’t like she had much they could take.

The walk home was as uneventful as it usually was, and Gilda had calmed her nerves by the time she reached her door. The neighborhood was its typical self soon after nightfall. Indoor lights turned on, a pawful of friends outside speaking to each other in the cooler air. A few acquaintances waved at her and she responded in kind. Some kids ran from one side of the street to the other and she passed a tired griffon pulling a cart full of metal stuff. She nodded respectfully and both kept to their own.

Her house was typical to its neighborhood. A simple sitting room by the entrance with a round window to the ‘front porch’, a strip of pointless dirt with a small stone path to the door. At least the door was locked when she came in and then locked it from the inside. Not that she was afraid of something: that was good practice in that part of Griffonstone. Lately, every now and then one heard of a mugging a little too close for comfort. Still, she had never been a victim herself.

Inside she left the stand by the door, took a glass of water from a jar and looked for something to eat. The best she found was some dried fish that looked wilted. Eh… Some tomato sauce and it would be good enough for her mood. It’s not like she could afford a cold room in her house to better preserve her food. But at least she lit a small fire in her oven to heat it a little and make it somewhat tasty. Better than the soybeans hamburgers crap ponies pushed as meat substitute for griffons. Or the kirin cheese.

Finally, in between forkfuls of questionable fish and acid tomato sauce she paid some attention to the paper the judge had given her. It was a pamphlet about the works available for community service. Convenient.

It was an overdesigned list of jobs with a short description. Those included cleaning public walkways, which was pretty straightforward. Picking up trash other griffons threw on the street. Pass.

Cleaning the gutters which was also straight forward as it was disgusting. One would think that the damn griffons that are so damn fussy about their coats and about as fussy as their feathers as the pegasi would have built a decent sewer system like the ones they have in Canterlot or Manahattan. But no… Putting money on something that would actually make the lives of their citizens better was unthinkable! Yeah, whatever. Gilda was not going to clean gutters either.

Next was hospital service, which included bathing and caring for patients in the city’s hospital. It was a rather good hospital, she was told. 

And some others she didn’t bother reading about.

The job that did interest her was cloud duty. Moving clouds certainly seemed cleaner than public walkways and gutters and the pegasus weather team was certainly less of a hassle than what she was likely to find in the hospital.

Decided. Now to bake some scones. She would take them for selling in the morning after her appointment in the city hall. She would preferably wake earlier and bake the scones so that they would be fresher, but that also worked since she would be busy for a while in the morning.

When her work was done Gilda went upstairs. She didn’t feel like a bath or anything, so tired she was, but at the same time, after the night in the jail she decided that her coat was filthy with dirt and sweat. Bath wouldn’t be a luxury, rather a necessity. Fortunately, there wasn’t a need for too much preparation. Simply pouring the water and some soap on the tub and caring for her feathers and brushing her fur was enough. It wasn’t like her house had showers, much less heating.

In the meanwhile, she wondered if maybe she should get into contact with Rainbow Dash and her princess friend. By what she knew, Princess Twilight Sparkle wouldn’t appreciate it if she tried to make use of her friendship, but what the heck? She was Rainbow’s friend! And her need was legitimate if the mayor’s wife was going to do something to her.

Well, she should at least try something.

Before sleep she wrote a letter to Rainbow Dash and she would drop it off on her way to the city hall.

But rather than feeling better, laying in her bed invited more thoughts rather than sleep. She thought of the two gals she had met in the jail. What had happened to them? One of them was being accused of thievery and Gilda had the impression that she was done for. Would probably be sent to some prison. But the other… It didn’t even make sense that Gertrude was arrested for trying to survive. Did the idiots in charge realize that she was doing that for survival, and because of things that were out of her control She was trying hard.

Again, her fur stood on her back at the idea of herself being forced down that path. In the dark of her bedroom, she hugged herself and did her best to steer her thoughts in another direction.

This whole mess with the Chancellor under accusations of all sorts of improper use of his office and the whole thing about the new griffon king was confusing. A little scary. King? When did the griffons decide that they didn’t want their elected representative in the Hall of Friendship anymore and some northerner griffon everyone seemed scared of should be their king? Heck, she barely even remembered from school there was a hold of Griffonia in the north… It was said that he wanted to change the entire governing system and Princess Celestia was perfectly fine with that.

She sighed and turned to the other side on her bed. Chancellor, king… Whatever. It would still be Celestia’s face on the money and just another jerk to listen with the same excuses and bullshit about why her life sucked. She would still have to worry about baking and selling her scones if the big-awesome-badass future king of the griffons didn’t get the holds to reinstate the basic income. Whatever… When this whole mess blew past it was likely that Chancellor Gail would reinstate the damn thing anyway. Have would just have to survive, like everyone else.

She was too tired to try and make sense of all that.


	2. Labor

Morning came cold and wet, but Gilda’s head had cleared enough that she could see that the way forward was simple enough. She donned her leather pouch and dutifully marched to the city hall, but before going inside the large stony building she dropped her letter to Rainbow Dash in the mailbox outside. That simple act made her feel better and safer. Ready to deal with the day’s manticore: getting started on community service. It might even be relaxing. Once the day got warmer, messing with the cold clouds was always relaxing.

Past the large iron and glass doors she found herself stepping in a cold marble floor and right by the entrance of the large atrium was an information table. Perfect.

A griffon sat on the other side reading the newspaper. The front page was a map of Griffonia separated in the south and southwest territories against the north and northeast territories painted in different shades of gray. The headline read ‘Loyalist army captured in Snow Mountains Hold’.

So now there were armies… There wasn’t even supposed to be an actual war.

Whatever. Not her problem. She called the griffon at the desk by tapping at the table. “Hey… I gotta go to Community Services.”

A yellow griffon paw simply pointed up to a large placard affixed on a pillar that pointed to different offices. Her destination was on the second floor, to the right of the stairs, so she hurried there. Didn’t bother thanking whoever was behind the newspaper either.

The checkered white and black pattern in the floor almost made her eyes go cross and the puke yellow walls made her feel she was ready to die. The white roof didn’t help much, and neither did artificial magical lights in the white ceiling. Along the corridor where many benches occupied by griffons that clearly didn’t want to be there, but Gilda supposed she understood.

Fortunately, she found her destination without much of a walk, but there was someone inside, so she sat on the bench, next to an abandoned newspaper. And she waited.

And she waited.

She huffed, not even caring to think about how long had passed and grabbed the newspaper someone had left in the bench. Opening on a random page she was greeted with a photograph of some old, but restored castle in a cold place. Its towers held long banners with Princess Cadance’s cutie mark, assorted hearts and cutesy stuff that the ponies loved, giant stained-glass windows and more decorative banners atop the towers and the palace-like structure of the main keep inside.

‘The Bordello of Candy, sieged by the Royal Guard.’ The headline read with giant bold letters.

“What the heck?” What in Tartarus were the ponies doing? Wasn’t that place a brothel or something?

[i]Earlier this week the Royal Guard sieged the ancient castle that houses the world-famous Bordello of Candy in the Crystal Empire. According to witnesses the event followed the arrival of Princess Luna and Queen Chrysalis on the capital, which quickly enacted martial-law and mandatory curfew to the population.[/i]

Queen Chrysalis? What?

[i]The pair was then seen ridding a coach to the old castle and haven’t left yet, despite Princess Cadance having been seen leaving it under a escort of Luna’s Royal Guards.[/i]

[i]Due to the curfew still being in place at the time this was written, our correspondents could not enter the Bordello, but little more than 24h later an entire detachment of the Royal Guard arrived. With the Presence of Princess Celestia, King Thorax and Prince-Consort Chocolate Velvet they surrounded the place and hostilities were initiated with the use non-lethal weapons and spells.[/i]

[i]After a quick skirmish changeling forces defending the castle surrendered. There is no new information as of the publishing of this paper after the Royal Guard has taken control of the towers and the gates remained closed afterwards.[/i]

Great. That reminded her of the time the Moon just stuck to the sky and it was only days later they even heard about that mess with Nightmare Moon.

She stared at the text she had just read and blinked a few times until she noticed another griffon, a tan and white male, next to her reading the paper she held.

“You think that’s bad?” He said angrily. “I have a friend in Ponyville and he said Princess Celestia had ordered the local militia to apprehend Princess Twilight and all her friends right before they escaped on the Princess’ airship. Can you believe this? Griffonia is going to the shitter and the ponies are going around doing stupid pony stuff.”

Gilda swallowed a lump of insecurity and fear that just formed in her throat. She knew Rainbow’s friend enough to know that if Twilight was out and about doing something like that things were bad. Even worse, her letter may never reach Rainbow.

Other than that, she started worrying that her morning was going down the drain and she obviously hadn’t sold a single scone. She just agreed with the griffon, not really thinking about it.

Sometime later, she was still waiting and pulling her bang feathers. “Ugh, come on! How long does it take to pick a job off a list?!”

The other griffons in the corridor stared at her and she pretended she hadn’t said anything. But after a few more minutes she stood and stormed through the door to a simple office with a window, a desk, an old yellow and brown griffon lady talking to another old griffon lady, but she was tan and yellow. Both glared at Gilda.

“I have an appointment!”

“Ugh. Fine. See you later, Guelly.” Yellow and brown grunted and then waved goodbye to the other that walked past Gilda with a more than disgusted stare. Of course, she responded with her own evil eye.

“What do you want?” The remaining old griffon growled at her.

“Isn’t it your job to talk to the griffons that come here?” Her voice raised a little, less at the slight and more at the wasted time she could have made money selling scones. But she felt conscious of mentioning that to that particular old griffon.

“Sweetie, you’re a criminal. Nobody cares about your problems.” The other simple didn’t seem interested anyways.

“I’m not a criminal! I punched a jerk that stole from me!” Gilda snapped back.

The old one on the other side of the desk was not impressed at all. “Royal Law says that makes you a criminal. Go take it out with The Mare. Now, since I’m stuck with you here… Name?”

She had to contain herself not to break something and simply sat angrily on the chair. “Gilda.”

She knew better than to ask her to hurry while the old griffon shuffled through the papers repeating the name to herself until she finally pulled it out of the pile. “Ah. Gilda. Hum… Got two Gildas. Parent names?”

“Grendel and Gaud.” She said simply.

“Ah… This is you. Wait. You punched a kid?!” She put down the paper. “What is wrong with you?”

At least she got the right one. “I have anger issues, apparently! I want the cloud duty job.”

She kept seated to the chair while the old griffon hummed to herself and looked at a list for a minute or two. Nice office… Yellow walls, brown door window right to the next building. At least she would never have to work in an office like that.

“It’s taken.” Old yellow finally said.

“What do you mean it’s taken?”

“No positions available.” She glared back at Gilda. “You have to choose the hospital or the gutters.”

Gilda stared at her for a second too. “Because life doesn’t suck enough, right?”

“Hah, wait till you get older, sweetheart.” The griffon snickered from the other side of the table.

At least things seemed to be consistent in that place. Everything sucked. Gilda held her face and grunted loudly. She really didn’t want to take the hospital job… Cleaning patients sounded like it was going to suck. Messing with wounds and listening to sick griffons whining just didn’t seem like it was going to be bearable for more than a second. On the other paw… The gutters.

“How bad are the gutters?” The government employee whose salary came from her taxes showed her a list with exactly zero names on it. “That bad huh. Fine… Put me in the damn hospital.”

“Alright. Just a second.” The other said smugly.

After several minutes of answering dumb questions about diseases she had or might have had and even more uncomfortable personal questions involving sexual partners and kinks that made Gilda convinced the old griffon was asking more for herself than for whatever form she had to fill, the creepy old jerk was done embarrassing her and finally gave her a small paper card with her name and a stamp.

“Give this to Worker Resources. You’re expected to be there one past noon. Don’t be late. They have to train your worthless ass before you can even get started.”

Gilda took the card and secured it in her pouch. Fine. The sooner she started, the sooner she’d get it over with, even if that meant no scones sold. At least she was done looking at that creepy old fuck’s face.

“Any questions, Gilda?”

“Will I get paid or something?”

“Yes!” The old griffon grinned in such a cruel way Gilda regretted asking anything. “One free meal per day and a cap that says ‘I’m a Good Griffon’. You’re doing community service, dumbass… They’re doing you a favor so that they don’t send you to Shatteredrock and it doesn’t get too crowded with violent asses like yourself.”

“Fine. Thanks.” She couldn’t wait to get out of that place, turning on the chair to leave.

“You’re welcome!” Her cheery voice just punctuated how pissed Gilda felt by then.

She wouldn’t give that old jerk the satisfaction of slamming the door like she felt doing, but she almost screamed when she saw the clock on the wall outside the damn thing said it was a quarter to noon! The whole morning spent in that stupid place and now she wouldn’t have time to go home, lunch and then be on time at the hospital!

It would also, probably be a good idea to not tell others why she was stuck doing community service…

Regardless, maybe she could eat something in the plaza in front of the hospital. Or maybe they had some sort of cafeteria or restaurant in there.

[center]***[/center]

The hospital was a large and wide building, but she already knew that. It looked rather new, and the entrance were large, decorated wood doors and inside it was all washed-out green linoleum and white masonry walls and ceiling with the occasional iron chandelier holding the magical lights. A giant atrium/reception with totems signing the direction to wherever one needed to go.

Turns out they did have a restaurant in the hospital. But it was meant only for staff and patients, still she lost about half an hour while the griffons in there discussed whatever or not someone on community service was part of the staff. After they decided that she was indeed part of the staff, they told her that she wasn’t part of the staff [i]yet[/i] because she had to report to Worker Resources for that to become true.

Griffons and logic.

Hungry and upset, she went outside to the back area where the cafeteria was. It was a covered area next to the outer wall, behind the hospital, close to a small garden under the windows of the patient rooms. There were actually two cafeterias, one for griffons and one for ‘the others’ with tables under the covered area, but the griffon one was closed, and she had to eat from the ‘pony one’, as she decided she would call it because it was owned by two earth ponies.

In the end it was a good thing she was so hungry because she didn’t think she could eat that disgusting soybean hamburger she bought for one Bit. At least the damn thing was cheap! She didn’t even feel like eating the fried potato because it just made her think of ‘pony food! And she paid four Bits for the whole meal with the potatoes, the apple juice (from Sweet Apple Acres, of course), and the extra onions she asked.

Then one of the owners came to her table with a very apologetic look on her face. “I’m sorry the food isn’t very good for you ma’am. It really is meant for ponies that want to eat with their griffon friends, but it is something you can eat.”

She was a deep red earth pony with a greenish mane wearing an apron and carrying trays on her back. Had a sliced tomato for cutie mark and green eyes that at least seemed like she was legitimately sorry.

Then she started gathering plates from the nearby tables. “It seems as though meat prices have soared because most of it comes from the northern holds and the larger businesses are buying all the farm meat, seafood and poultry they can. Smaller food businesses are closing all over.”

Gilda didn’t say anything, but she hadn’t asked! She had enough troubles to worry about rather than worrying about others. Still…

“Doesn’t help that the ponies regulate the meat farming industry into oblivion.” She grumbled, as though the poor pony was at fault. She felt bad for it, but she was in an awful mood.

“We, hum… Decided to return you two Bits, since you didn’t like it.” She put the coins from the pouch in her apron on Gilda’s table.

That surprised Gilda. Maybe she was just having a bad day and this small act of kindness not only helped a lot, but it made her feel better. “Thanks.”

“It’s not our fault.” The pony explained, almost offended. “Princess Celestia follows the regulations other races vote on. The problem is that hooved creatures find it grisly that eat the flesh of other hooved creatures. Especially when they are intelligent too. They settled on a compromise with fish and other things, like eels. But even then, some dairy farms get permission to sell the meat of deceased cows. I hear it’s not very good, though. There is also the game meat from the north, but I don’t understand the politics behind that.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m just angry today…” The pony went back to her job of clearing the tables, but Gilda was curious about the problem then. “Why is fish expensive? I mean… I understand that the griffons in the north have a problem with the ones in the south because of the Chancellor and him being a corrupt ass. But… Don’t our fish come from the coast?”

The pony shook her head. “Actually, most of the coastal cities don’t export their fish. Or they export only a portion of it. Most of our fish comes from Mount Aris. They have humongous fish and kelp farms. That should be normal, though. The problem is that Queen Novo is miffed about The Lion and some bad things his friends say about hippogriff and Chancellor Gail’s corruption accusations. She’s put some heavy taxes on their fish coming to Griffonia. Actually, everything coming here through Mount Aris. Larger businesses don’t care, but smaller ones simply can’t pay. That also drove the price of poultry to Luna’s stars, since they’re buying all they can. On the other hoof, one of the companies that makes soy hamburgers lowered prices. The owner says it’s because it’s going to prevent famine in here.”

“That sucks.” Gilda frowned. “I’d think that Princess Celestia would do something about it instead.”

“Well, she could. But she typically avoids intervening unless it is really necessary because of the Princess Meddling Accord.” Since Gilda never heard of it, or never bothered with it she had no idea what the pony was talking about and her face probably showed it, the pony went on. “It says that the Alicorn Princesses aren’t supposed to mess with individual nations within the confederation to maintain their sovereignty. Only if things get out of hoof.”

“I’d say that her subjects getting out of food and corrupt officials screwing us over fits.” Gilda grumbled, suddenly in a bad mood again.

The pony simply shrugged. “The princesses know what they are doing.”

Ugh… Typical pony. The little bastards were almost incapable of admitting their precious princess was screwing up. It almost made Gilda want to return to that place and ask what that was about when the news of the Princess doing weird shit in the feathering Bordello of Candy. With the damn Changeling Queen and that cuck they call the Changeling King.

Not that she knew much about that Thorax, but she struck him as a giant wuss simply for marrying the Changeling Queen. What the hell, wasn’t she supposed to be his mother or something? Freaking weird changelings! Not to mention she was supposed to have disappeared, or something. What the heck was wrong with the world?

“Well, thanks for the service. And for returning some of money. The rest was great, though.” She said cleaning her beak with a napkin and leaving it with the rest of her uneaten ‘hamburger’.

“You’re welcome! If you ever wish to try some of our other dishes, we’d be delighted to have you!” The pony ‘ponied’ at her, all sappy and friendly.

She thanked the pony again and left. She didn’t want to get late for her first shift.

Finding the Worker Resources department was easy due to some helpful, and likely wealthy griffon doctors. Past the door with the plaque that identified it was a waiting room where Gilda presented herself to a tan and white griffoness with beautiful red highlights on her feathers. She presented the card she was given and then waited for a few minutes while the other went to the next room. Soon she was called. A unicorn pony, deep blue with a well-kept and short lighter mane and gray eyes sat behind a desk when she passed the door.

He even had a cyan tie and offered a hoof. “Hi Gilda! Nice to meet you! I’m Azure Suit!”

Fitting name… Regardless, she bumped his hoof with a fist and sat in front of him.

“I see here that you got yourself in a bit of a problem with the law!” She wondered what he was so cheery about. “We’re glad that you’re now a part of the team and that we can help you pay your debt to the great city of Griffonstone! I’m gonna get your papers through to administration as soon as I come back. Come. I’ll take you to your supervisor, Miss Goldina. We call her ‘Golden Heart’.”

He chuckled as he stood up, and Gilda dutifully followed him through the corridors. More light green linoleum floor and white masonry walls with the eventual chandelier in between rooms for patients, walking briskly after the pony and passing doctors, nurses, patients and visitors, mostly griffons. They passed different wings for different specializations and different wards.

“We are the largest hospital in the area, and we receive patients from all cities in the hold and complex cases from the next ones. Our job is very important, Gilda. I hope you see that while you work. We are excellent to our patients and we expect excellence from our team. Part of which you will be for the next two months. Don’t worry, though. Administration urges all of the staff to be excellent also towards each other too, so if you have any questions, or suggestions, we urge you to be open to your colleagues!”

She wished she could have paid more attention to what he was saying, but the smells in that place started getting on her nerves. It was a shame, since the pony seemed to be so nice and enthusiastic about her presence there. It was blood and the smell of ‘remedies’. It was a weird pungent smell that got her on edge. Also, the idea of… Sick creatures. Well, she would have to get used to it.

Finally, they reached a larger room in between the patient rooms with a central table and some cabinets on the walls. More cabinets and windows in the deep wall. Some griffons busied themselves with ‘hospital’ stuff and stared simply enough to see that whatever was happening didn’t concern them. One of them dropped what she was doing and went to them.

She had a very peculiar shade of yellow in her fur that mimicked gold, and also in the tips of her top feathers and around her deep pink eyes. 

“Hi! Can I help you Azure? Who is your friend?” She asked all happy.

“Hi Golden. This is Gilda. She’s here to supplement the nursing staff with non-medical tasks.” He nodded at Gilda and that was ‘code’ if she ever heard it.

“Oh! I see! Welcome, Gilda!” At least her soon would be boss grinned all excited at her.

“Uh… Hi!” She said with her best smile, but she feared it came of as standoffish. Not that the ‘golden’ griffon let that bother her.

“Don’t you worry, I got you under my wings!” She piped and gave Azure a thumb up. “I’ll show you the ropes and assign you to some easy patients to get you started!”

Gilda let an uncomfortable chuckle escape. “Thanks Miss Goldina.”

“Nah! Call me Golden! Everyone does!” She then grabbed Gilda’s paw and pulled her to walk with her down the corridor, leaving Azure behind. “Now, do you have any experience in taking care of sick creatures? The elderly?”

“No… I don’t. I live alone, actually.”

“Ah, it’s alright.” The other griffon waved a paw while they walked. “There isn’t really much to this job. All you have to do is be nice, patient and caring to them.”

Three of the things Gilda was most definitively not good at.

[center]***[/center]

The training session took hours, but it felt like it had taken entire days. At least it didn’t seem so bad after learning a thing or two. Really all she had to do was listen to them complain and not really do anything other than tell one of the real nurses, unless it was within her rather short list of attribution.

Change dressings of simple wounds, clean said wounds, change the bedding if needed, help patients eat. Open the window, close the window… Fortunately, bathing and helping them go to the bathroom was beyond her list of tasks. She supposed they wouldn’t trust just any shmuck, much less a ‘criminal’ to do those things.

‘Golden’ even took her on a small tour and showed her, [i]in vivo[/i], how to do stuff, and back in their teaching room, her supervisor finished it up with a few quick additional tips.

“Now, you should go home and study this!” Goldina grinned while she put a relatively small book on the table they shared. She had that earnest stare of someone who really cared. “I know that you would rather not be here but give this job a chance! It can be hard at times, even if you’re not really a full nurse, but patients don’t usually see the difference and their gratitude will creep on you and take you by the heart!”

“Okay…” Gilda said slowly. “So… Until tomorrow?”

“Yes. Officially, your obligations here start at one past noon, but it is a good practice to be at least one hour early. So that you can participate in our meeting.”

Yeah. Fat chance… Gilda did her best to smile anyway. “Thanks, Miss Goldina. Er… Golden. I’ll be here tomorrow.”

“Alright! Bye!” She grinned widely again as Gilda collected the book she had offered and then smiled as friendly as she could while she stashed it under her wing and then left before she got more uncomfortable.

She thought of picking up the scones she baked yesterday and trying to sell them, but she would likely not be able to sell enough to justify the time she’d invest in it. After little time thinking about it, she decided she’d go home and try and study that book and not screw up everything on the first day.

Getting home Gilda picked up the book Goldina had given her. Sat on her small couch in the sitting room, made herself comfortable and started reading.

Minutes later she was bored, so she left the book.

Seconds later she picked it up again because she realized that she had to take that thing seriously or else she might have to see Judge Gracey again, and if she went to see Judge Gracey again she would likely end up in a prison, and if she ended up in a prison, she would end up in the same path Gertrude and Grizelda did. She just couldn’t let that happen to her. Period.

Thus, with the late afternoon spent in frantic studying, she hoped was effective as it was semi-panicked, she could barely keep her paws under her on her way to her bed and slept as soon as she collapsed on it.

After a short night of sleep, she woke to the noise from the street outside her window. The usual noises of griffons and other residents going about their businesses of starting with their day or the ones that begged for things like pieces of metal, anything they could sell for a pittance. Dragging herself out of her bed she readied herself for the new day by starting on the process of baking fresh scones. She had planned to do just that before sleep, but at least the things would be as fresh as they would ever be. She could put them up with the ones from yesterday and it would be fine. It’s not like they had gone bad.

Not much time to waste, she would rush to the plaza with Grover’s statue as soon as she was ready. At least it was close to the hospital. She hated the idea of not being able to sell her stuff in the afternoon because she had to be in the hospital. Hey… What if she could sell her scones to the hospital staff? Many of them already did buy those from her during the night shifts! What a great idea!

Wait… What if she doesn’t have time to do that? She knocked her own forehead and called herself stupid. She was going there to work. And not even as a ‘free’ worker. It wasn’t very likely that she’d have a lot of time to sit her ass somewhere and sell scones. Maybe, if she knew the people there, she could sell them by the bunches, but she couldn’t open her stand in the hall and sell the things.

Maybe after she made some acquaintances. Maybe after they recognize her as the griffon selling them scones at night.

Heh… She looked at herself, making plans. Maybe that whole ordeal would be good for her after all. She smiled to herself, just a little. Maybe next time she met Dash she’d be a respectable owner of a whole bakery? She could dream, couldn’t she?

That or she was trying to distract herself from the fact that she had to do a shitty job she didn’t want to do for an unfair reason and because she punched someone that deserved to be punched.

Whatever. Bitching about it wouldn’t help her. Getting stuff done would, so she quickly gathered what little she’d need, other than the book Goldina had given her. When her scones were ready, still hot from the oven, she wrapped them in a delicate cloth she had just for that, put them in a bowl and took her foldable stand.

After an uneventful walk to the plaza, she set up her stand and let the scones sit on the bowl, over the cloth. Then she put her best smile.

And she held it for the majority of the morning, but as the sun rose and the time for her to present for her job came closer and scones became less and less fresh before her, the smile on her face diminished until she finally let go a deep and sorrowful sigh when it was time to leave for lunch, which she chose to not have so that she could stay and hopefully sell something.

Instead, she ate a few of her scones before leaving. They tasted nice and she hoped that the extra few minutes that gave her would yield at least a sell or two.

It didn’t. And she was supposed to present herself soon. Then an idea dawned on her. It was almost a stroke of genius. Something she once saw a pony do in Ponyville, and if it worked there, it would surely work there. She should leave the stand with the scones and the bowl in a way that griffons that went by saw them and would leave the money in the bowl for the scones they took.

Part of her insisted that was an incredibly stupid and naive idea, after all nobody had left money when she was arrested, and her scones were gone. But it had worked for the pony in Ponyville! She didn’t really have a choice. It had also occurred to her that she didn’t really have the time to take everything home and come back. She would rather not piss off her supervisors in her first day of work and risk being sent to see Judge Gracey again.

So, she decided for leaving her scones in the plaza while she went to the hospital. She neatly placed the cloth with the scones next to the bowl. Even made a little pyramid with the things and arranged the cloth as a diamond next to it, making sure the little plaque with the prices was visible. When she was satisfied, she left with a few minutes to spare.

Step after step towards the big building she almost convinced herself that she was going insane with that talk of community service, prostitution, the griffon king, being sent to a prison and barely making it week to week with the scones. She probably made a weird face, or something with the way griffons looked at her, walking past.

But then, walking past the doors, she saw Goldina in the middle of the hall as though she expected someone, and she waved and smiled warmly at Gilda as soon as she saw her.

“Hi Gilda! You made it! Horray! You missed our meeting, but it’s okay!”

“Yeah…” She hesitated and rubbed the back of her neck. She completely forgot about the meeting. “I guess…”

“That is great, though! One step at a time, right?” ‘Golden’ beamed at her and she got the book from under her wing.

“I brought back your book. I studied… I’m ready.” Why the heck was she so nervous? Her smile must’ve come up all wrong because Goldina looked at her like she was her mother or something.

“Come on!” The golden griffon lady smiled some more. “First task of the job is returning it to its place so you know where to find it if you need it. You’re not expected to do everything by heart, you know? You can look at the book whenever you need. Come on.”

She concluded with a beckoning wing gesture and Gilda followed her to the second floor, past another hall, a few doors in a hallway and into that room where griffons worked on ‘hospital’ stuff.

Actually, according to the book, there were separated rooms for doctors and for nurses. Hey! She did learn something!

“So, here is where we keep this book.” Goldina told her while the others watched casually or simply went on with their jobs of writing stuff down or did what Gilda assumed was preparing medications. Nonetheless, she placed the book in its place on the shelf. “We keep it here so that the new ones can find it easily. Don’t hesitate to open it again to look for information you might need, or even, asking one of the others. The important thing is to get the job done right, not to do it by yourself. Right staff?”

The other griffons, and one or two ponies in the room grunted collectively, some more enthusiastic than others and waved at Gilda, who waved at them too, if out of embarrassment.

“Now!” Goldina went on. “This is our board!”

A black board with a few pieces of chalk and an eraser tied to it. Nothing too fancy, but someone had drawn a table on it. File number, patient names, condition and room. Quite simple, but certainly efficient.

“And these are your patients. Just three of them, since this is your first day. Take your time and do everything just like in the book. I’ll be around if you need anything, but the others will help too if you need it. Just pretend you’re confident.”

“Uh… Thanks.” She grabbed the three clipboards the other griffon gave her.

Nothing more than a couple of paper sheets with stuff about the patients. First one was recovering from a surgery on his neck. The second had a wound on his thigh and the dressing needed to be removed since the doctor was going to see him, and the third was waiting for surgery… Apparently, she had to ask him a few things.

Well, alright. Seemed simple enough. She thanked Goldina again and checked the room numbers in the table, and then she looked at the details for her first patient. It was some guy that had a lump removed from the side of his neck, or something. The medical jargon was a bit annoying but she managed. She supposed she didn’t really need to understand what was wrong with the guy, only that she would care for his wound. She was supposed to see if he was okay and see if he was awake. Then clean the surgical wound and take note of any complaints to be directed at the medical staff. All right. Nothing too complicated.

She also knew what she would need and finding the stuff wasn’t too hard. In fact, the nursing staff had everything already set up and prearranged in neat cloth packs. She grabbed one of the ‘kits’ from the locker and put on her back with the clipboards and made her way to the room. Come to think of it, Goldina must really be trusting of hers to simply let her be on her own. She better not disappoint.

“Oh! Just one more thing!” Speaking of Goldina, she waited for Gilda by the door with a huge smile and she put a white cap on Gilda’s head. “This is our uniform! You gotta keep it clean and come wearing it to your shift. Also, return it at the end of your tour. Any questions?”

“Not really. No.” Honestly, Gilda just wanted to be done with it, but anyways, Goldina let her go into the wild of the Surgery Ward.


	3. Actual Labor

At least Gilda appreciated that Goldina would let her work on her own and not watch over her shoulders at every step and little decision she had to make. On the other paw, she was alone without someone watching over her shoulder to make sure she wasn’t screwing up and every decision she made had the potential to mess everything completely up.

When baking scones, the worst that could happen was burning a batch. Or punching someone in the face when trying to sell, apparently. That line of thought wasn’t helping.

Fortunately, it was a short walk to the room where her first patient waited. She knocked and someone on the other side said she could come in with not the most excited of voices. Opening the door, she entered a small but neat room with an open window above a nightstand and a bed right next to it. A green and white male griffon laid on his side looking like he was not having the best of times right then.

“Hello? Mister, uh…” She looked at the clipboard and then back at him. “Godfrey?”

“Hi, miss.” He raised his head for a second or two to look at her but gave up soon enough while she walked over. The groan he gave out was a good indication that he wasn’t feeling very well. A quick look at the clipboard told her that he was on several medications. That was probably why he didn’t feel very well, but which one was above her and honestly, not for her to mess with anyways.

He had a dressage wrapped several times around his neck and it was stained red in one spot. The smell of blood aggravated her, but not enough to cause her to heave or anything; it wasn’t as bad as she had anticipated. There was also the chemical smell of… Medical stuff that emanated from the thing and her skin crawled a bit, but memories of Judge Gracey were worse.

She coughed into her paw. “So, I’m gonna clean this thing for you. And uh… Do you need anything?”

“It just hurts a bit, but it’s fine.” He said groggily and seemed to sleep again.

She stared at him for a few seconds and then shrugged. Fine. The sooner she got it done, the sooner she could go home and the less she would have to bother the poor guy.

She opened the ‘kit’ she brought over the nightstand and found all she would need. A pair of curved bowls some gauze, and a sponge with a foul-smelling soap. A rounded scissor and tweezers. There were names for the different types, but she couldn’t be bothered with those details or care about what those were called. They were tweezers.

There was also a pair of gloves, after all, one wouldn’t care for the wounds of others with the same paws they walk all over in the floors, dirt and whatnot. Funny thing they ate with those… Well, they washed their paws. Worse was carrying stuff with her beak, but she was supposed to be mindful of where she touched stuff. She would never think about the way she ate and carried stuff in the same manner ever again.

She sighed and looked at the dressing with the dark red spot on it. She stalled long enough.

Slowly cut open the dressage, a little surprised at how careful she was, and wondered to herself how much of that was respect for her fellow griffon, fear that she might screw up her job or being sent back to Judge Gracey. Whatever the case was, it wasn’t as bad as she had imagined. It was a nasty wound, some four fingers long, all mucked up with something she supposed was the same ointment she was supposed to apply to it when she was done, but also some wet lumps of blood. The smell bothered her, but it was the weird ‘hospital smell’. They had shaved his fur around the area, and it was mostly clean, safe for the immediate area of the cut. She supposed she wasn’t the first one to care for his surgical wound.

It felt a bit weird that it was two lips of skin kept together with small threads, as in ‘unnatural’ but it didn’t bother her as much as she had thought. Maybe that whole thing really wouldn’t be as bad as she had thought.

The wound was swollen though, and she was afraid she’d hurt that guy if she even touched it. But well, it was her job. Other than the smell from the soap, it was fine. The ointment and the clotted blood came off easily enough into the small bowl she put under his neck. He kept sleeping too and that was great as far as she was concerned since she was a bit nervous at the whole thing. First time and everything.

It even looked nice. As nice as a stitched-up cut would look, after she poured some of the cold water she got from the bathroom.

Next, she applied the ointment. It smelled like chamomile, or something, and it was a bit greasy, but if she was supposed to apply it, she would. Griffons much smarter than she was had decided that they should apply that stuff to wounds, after all.

Then she covered it with gauze and wrapped the dressing around it, and before she knew it, she was done. Looked pretty neat too!

That wasn’t so hard, and she couldn’t keep from smiling! She also was glad that guy was so knocked out and didn’t see it. She cleared her throat and got rid of the dirty water in the bathroom to then return the used-up stuff to the appropriated disposal area in the nurse’s room.

Then she went to clean her paws in the sink, the book said, after all, that she was supposed to wash her paws before and after any task. Nobody seemed to care about her except for a female, a paler shade of tan she was, with brown eyes that approached to wash her paws too, though, for some reason Gilda felt like she was there just to talk to her.

“So, what’s your story?” She asked with a curious smirk. “The chief’s taken a liking to you and you’re way off the season from the nursing school.”

“Community service.” She said as dryly as she could. She hoped she wouldn’t incur on some sort of discrimination from her fellow, actually trained, nurses. Maybe it was her own insecurity, but she might be angry herself if someone with barely any training got in the way of her job.

“Oh! Cool!” The other brightened up, completely opposite to what Gilda feared. “I thought that someone had gotten you a job here, or something!”

“Yeah… No.” She kept her dry tone while minding her paws. Try as she would, she was just nervous at the whole thing.

“What’s your name? What’s your actual work?” The paler one was way too excited for Gilda’s taste, letting her wings flare and almost dropping medicines and medical stuff that was on a nearby shelf. “Oh! What did you do? Did you kill someone?!”

Really? She was going to answer, in the fullest way possible, but another beat her to it.

“Come on, Gina.” Another of the nurses in the room, a yellow and white male chuckled and approached, much to Gilda’s relief. “You don’t get community service for murder.”

“Hey! I think I know you!” He beamed at Gilda.

“I’m Gilda… I actually bake and sell scones. And I punched a dude.” She said, still as defensive as she could. At least she convinced herself that she was just nervous. Those griffons were as friendly as they could be. “He stole from me.”

“Aw, sucks…” Male one said with a frown. “Yeah! I remember you! Great sconed! I hope you hurt him to make him regret it though. You look like a tough girl.”

Her cheeks felt hot at that and she coughed, staring away, not finding the words to reply to that. He wasn’t wrong! And she felt that creeping shame at having done something stupid.

It was the younger female that spoke. “Dude, that is bad! Griffons have anger issues, and we need to chill!”

Gilda’s eyebrow raised at that. “I thought you were excited that I was doing community service…”

“Well, yes… But we have some bad impulses that we need to refrain.”

“Don’t listen to her too much, Gilda.” The male one deadpanned. “She’s been listening to some unicorn jerk that says griffons need to be educated, or something. That we need stricter laws and whatnot. That we are dangerous, and such.”

“No! This is for real. He helped me get through university! I was all angry all the time and then my friends sent me to talk to him and he helped me achieve an inner peace I never thought I would. Maybe you should talk to him, Gilda!” She grinned way too much for comfort.

“Yeah…” Gilda grinned too, but awkwardly and coughed too. “I’ll think about it. I got work to do now.”

Fortunately, she didn’t insist, and they also had work to do. Both left her alone to check the file for her next patient. Some young guy working in construction fell and got a wound on his thigh. He got an infection and had to stay at the hospital after the surgery. She was supposed to remove the dressing, clean the wound and leave it for the doctor to see in his shift. She was also supposed to take his medication to him.

And if she remembered her study session correctly, she was supposed to leave the wound covered with a gauze so that it wasn’t too exposed for too long. Fine, she could do that.

Again, after grabbing the relevant ‘kit’ and the medications listed on his file, a couple of pills. She ahd a bit of trouble finding those, since she wasn’t used to the medicine cabinet, even if it was organized alphabetically, but she got them. She left and found the room after walking for a while down the corridor, pretending she was confident in her abilities and actually a member of the team. Everyone seemed too busy to give her attention anyways.

Knocking on the door a chirpy male voice told her to enter and she did. Another room, much like the other, with a white and dark gray griffon laying on his side too, but much more awake. Seemed barely an adult. His nightstand had a bottle of water and a glass.

“Hi!” He grinned and waved friendly at her.

“Hi, George. I’m Gilda.” She remembered his name from the file, walking in and closing the door. “I brought you your medicines, and I’m gonna clean your wound if you don’t mind.”

“Sure thing, ma’am.”

Did he just call her ‘ma’am’? Geez, what a dweeb. Well, he was kind of a kid yet.

Anyways, first things first, she gave him a small plastic cup with his pills and even served him a nice glass of water. She was supposed to ensure that he took his medicines and she watched like a hawk until he was done.

Wait, was she enjoying her job?

Regardless, satisfied that he had done as he was required, she opened up the cloth packet with the things she would need. She was also glad his wound was on the outside of his thigh, so he just laid on his side and away from her.

“So, you’ve been working here long?” He asked absentmindedly.

“No. I just came in.” She refrained from snarling while she cut the dressage around his thigh. It smelled bad, like… She didn’t even know. Not the chemical stink of the hospital, but like disease. She was almost glad she didn’t eat too much. Or that he couldn’t see her face right at the moment when she finished uncovering the wound. The gauze stuck to the dried off pus and blood, so she wet it a little, and felt a little acid burn in her throat at the smell, simply trying to pry off the sticky thing from the wound.

The lips of the wound were roughly stitched together with a soft rubber pipe stuck inside. It smelled of pus and drained a little at the sheets. There was a dry yellow coating over the bloody and swollen lips of the wound, not to mention some dried off blood that stuck to his coat past the shaved part. 

At least then she felt like she was actually paying for something but told herself not to freak out because it was either that or the same path Grizelda and Gertrude had taken. She could take her not-that-much-nurse task.

“Does it look too bad?” He raised his head and looked back at her. More like he was trying to strike a conversation.

She coughed down her nausea. Hopefully he didn’t notice. “Aaah… It’s doing as it should. You know… The doctor’s gotta see it.”

She wasn’t lying, if anything, the book did have pictures of how each kind of injure and their repair should look. At least it looked like it was fine enough.

“How did this happen? I read you work in construction. You look kinda young.”

She wasted no time in cleaning the ugly thing with the soaped sponge and a lot of water. All she had to do after was dry it off and she was done. Someone else would reapply the local medicines once the doctor had looked at it.

“Dad got me a job with his boss’ company. You know, to help with the money back home. I messed up and hurt myself.” He told her casually. Inside Gilda blamed the stupid ‘war that shouldn’t even exist’ and the stupid Chancellor that took their basic income away. And also, the stupid pony princess that didn’t fix that mess already. Although, she probably had some nasty stuff in her plate, judging by the news.

“This sucks. I hope you get better soon, dude.”

“Thanks! At least they said I can go to school as soon as I’m discharged from the hospital!”

She was supposed to change the sheets, but she doubted that kid could stand. Fortunately, the book taught her how to deal with that, and Goldina did too in their tour. She took off one side of the sheets, had the guy roll over the exposed rubber mattress and then removed the rest, cleaned the impermeable mattress, and replaced the sheets with a new set from the closet in the room. She supposed it was the sort of thing that got easier with practice. At least she was happy the kid helped as best as he could.

“So, do you need anything?” She did her best to seem friendly. “Any pain?”

“No. It’s okay.” He said. “Thanks Miss Gilda.”

“Say, are you all alone?”

“Mom is gonna come here to sleep with me, but she has to work during the day and my big sis has to watch my young brothers.”

“I see. Well, call if you need anything, kay?”

“I will!” He chirped. “Thanks again, Miss Gilda!”

“Hey… Doing my job.” She grinned at him and offered a closed fist he bumped with his own.

She hurried out the door this time and then repeated the process of discarding the used stuff. Looked up to the clock above the door. Half-past-two. Damn, it was going to be a long day.

The nurse room had its typical activity and when she entered one of the nurses, a female with a salmon coat and white plumage on her head approached all smiles. “Guys are saying you’re the gal that sells scones in the plaza! Can you get us some next shift? Those would be sweet to have in the meeting! We’re gonna pay you, of course! Gordon says your scones are great!”

“Sure!” Gilda grinned. “It’ll be my pleasure!”

“And don’t let Gina intimidate you… She’s kinda crazy, but she’s nice.” She did the spinning finger gesture next to her head. “Hey! You’re gonna dine with us, right? When the shift is done? 

“Sure. Gotta make use of my free meal a day.” Gilda chuckled nervously.

“Alright!” The other smiled. “See you later.”

Happy she actually was making acquaintances, she proceeded to check on the file of her next patient. Some guy that was going to do beak surgery. She was supposed to ask him a few questions and that was it. Fine. Seemed easy too and didn’t involve disgusting wounds.

Before setting on her way, she took a good look at the questions she was supposed to ask. Mostly stuff about allergies, previous diseases… Interaction with the health system. She was sure it was important and her asking the guy those questions would certainly make someone’s job easier.

Feeling prepared, she simply took the clipboard and a pencil. It was so simple it even had a pre-made questionnaire. With the stuff tucked under her wing, she walked out of the room and past one of her new colleagues on the hall. They nodded at each other. At least, she felt welcome.

Wondering how her scones were selling, she stopped before the open door of the relevant room and saw the fat dark-brown and yellow griffoness, the mayor’s wife, with her ‘little boy’ sitting on the bed.

It took her all her strength not to scream, but she fortunately reacted in time and hid past the door’s frame and was sure she wasn’t seen by either of them.

Just awesome! Things were looking annoying and not that great, but she was managing, and she had barely started making friends. Things could only get better. There was no way she could go into that room and deal with that old cunt and her spawn! She would recognize Gilda and make a scene. Being the wife to the damn mayor, she could ruin everything on the first day!

Another griffon in a white coat, probably a doctor, walked past her and raised an eyebrow at her. That was when she noticed she had sat and backed against the wall in her panic. She managed to smile awkwardly and sit like a normal griffon.

That didn’t solve the issue though. She was supposed to talk to that damn kid and that would be bad enough, but with his mother in the room… They would make a scene! They would ruin everything! That thought just wouldn’t leave her mind and she just wouldn’t be able to get inside!

“Hum, Gilda, is there a problem?” Goldina stared at her, her head tilted with curiosity and her voice like a worried mother.

Before she managed to answer Gilda had to cough a few times and restart her sentence some three times before she managed to speak like a damn adult. “It’s the kid I punched!”

Crap! She realized too late that she shouldn’t have said that! Now Goldina would be judging her too! Stupid kid was adult as could be!

But rather than that, the older griffon lady held her beak and hummed. “I see. I’ll take it from here. You should wait in the nurse’s room. Okay?”

She opened her paw for Gilda to give her the clipboard, which she did. “Now, don’t you worry, Gilda. I’ll meet you in the nurse’s room when I’m done. Try to relax a little. You look like you’re going to burst.”

It all happened too fast, and Gilda only came to herself when she heard Goldina greeting the pair inside the room. She wasn’t sure if she was in trouble or not, but she was relieved she didn’t have to go into that room and talk to those two. Finally, she relaxed, but she suddenly felt tired, and there was no point in staying in the hall like that. She slowly made her way to the nurse’s room. Felt like she walked to the gallows and the executor was a big white and gray griffon ready to pull the plank from under her.

In there she sat on the big central table and she didn’t even notice it before, but the pale tan female that was Gina approached her.

“You okay?” She sounded worried and put a friendly paw on her shoulder. “You look like you saw a ghost!”

Gilda didn’t feel like talking to anyone. “I guess…. I may have screwed up.”

She didn’t even know how she came up with the notion that it was her fault, but it would be too much trouble actually explaining what had happened. It didn’t help that the other griffon gasped in the same way Gilda would have expected out of that friend of Rainbow’s.

“Oh my gosh!” She held her face much too comically for Gilda’s tastes. “Did you scratch someone’s eye off in a fit of rage?”

“No! What the hell?!” That didn’t help. At all. She meant to try and explain the whole situation, but it seemed harder than it should be at the time.

Fortunately, her male friend dragged her off and Gilda was left alone in the room. She wanted to think about what she would do when Goldina came back and treated her like the criminal she was for what she had done to that kid. She was a professional after all and would know how bad it was. Alas, her head was filled with defeatist thoughts and the words from that griffon in the town militia echoed in her mind. Maybe she should leave Griffonstone. Maybe she could live for a while with Dash until she got a job in Ponyville. Fat chance she could compete with Pinkie and her pastries, though.

Oh man… It was all going so well. Eh… It all got ruined in the first day… The first hours, but at least she tried and did well enough while it lasted.

Sucked that the feeling didn’t actually help a whole lot.

It didn’t take too long for Goldina to return with the clipboard and place it with the others before chirping at Gilda. “Well, that was a bit of bad luck… But it’s sorted out now. His wound didn’t seem so bad, but anyways… I’m not a doc. How did you go with the others?”

Gilda blinked at her. That was all? “I didn’t screw it all up?”

“What? Don’t worry about that!” She giggled. “I saw some griffons really mess up their jobs here and you didn’t! You didn’t do anything wrong! It was just a tiny bit of bad luck. I took care of it. I wanted you to tell me, but I also checked on your other patients. You did great! Don’t worry about that anymore!”

Gilda hesitated before she spoke to the other. “Oh. Thanks.”

“You just gotta get started and before you know it, you’ll be free to go take care of your life. Though I’m biased towards hoping will be going to nursing school and joining the team in full. I would vouch for you!”

She would vouch for her. Nobody had ever told her anything remotely similar. She wasn’t even sure the older griffoness meant it for real, but it was so good hearing something like that.

“Now, I got a few more patients for you. The shift ends at seven, you know, and there is never a dull day around here.” The Goldina gave her a smug grin and elbowed playfully at her. “Just make sure you dine at the hospital’s restaurant before you go home.”

[center]***[/center]

She didn’t count how many patients she saw, but she was sure convinced the hospital was damn big. Perhaps it was for the best because one thing that she realized was that the job was rather repetitive. Sure, details mattered but, in its core, the job was repetitive. Maybe Goldina was nice to her and gave her the easiest patients and there was also the fact that she wasn’t a fully trained nurse, and she couldn’t really take care of more complex stuff, but she supposed that routine eventually caught up to everyone.

All her patients taken care of, slightly before seven, she walked the halls of the hospital towards the restaurant. They ought to serve her this time and she wondered for a second if her job meant anything. If her simple ‘community service’ tasks were worth anything. She supposed that if she took care of the simpler stuff, she could let the actual nurses take care of the more complicated patients. She could hope that she was being helpful and that the whole thing had a meaning, or at least something good came out of it. Other than she not getting sent to Shatteredrock, that was.

Also, Goldina said that she would vouch for her if she went to nursing school. Was that for real? She had some trouble believing it and her supervisor was probably trying to motivate her, or something. Gee, she, an actual nurse. She restrained herself or she might start giggling in the middle of the hallway where doctors and other nurses still went one way and another.

When she finally reached the door to the restaurant, they were open and most of the tables were filled of griffons and a few ponies having dinner. Approaching the table where the food was served one of the waiters greeted her.

“Hello nurse. We have grilled fish and potatoes, or minced meat lasagna for the main course. You can take whatever you want for complement.” He waved at the table before her. There already made dishes with grilled fish and others with the lasagna, but there were also bowls with cheese and ham rolls, white rice, rice with meat, rice with lentils, sliced tomatoes and onion salad, some more salads for the ponies, fried potatoes, potato salads…

Wow. Those guys ate well. She supposed the public healthcare system was working fine after all, and it was just the insignificant ‘numbers’ such as herself that struggled. She wondered for a second why didn’t Gail mess with the health system, since he stole everything he could. Eh… Pointless to wonder.

“I’ll have the fish!” She pointed.

“There you go.” He gave her one of the plates and she took her time getting a bit of everything from the rest of the table. It was a bit of hard work during the day, but at least she would eat well. She could even choose lemon, guava, strawberry or apple juice (from that place). And in another table were desserts! Grape gelatin and some sort of pave with chocolate.

She also saw the table with the nurses from that ward she worked on. Gina waved at her and she felt like she didn’t really have a choice. Took her tray with her fish, the rest of the stuff, her apple juice, and the piece of the pave.

“Hey, you made it!” One of the nurses she didn’t know the name of greeted her.

Goldina sat at the table too, with her own plate and glass of juice. “You did great for your first day, Gilda. Gerard, you could be nicer to your patients… Let’s try to be more friendly, alright?”

She said and a blue and navy griffon at the table blushed a little. “Sure, Mis Golden.”

While she watched, Gilda ate, and… Now, that fish tasted like fish!

She tried not to hurry as though she was starving and hadn’t had a decent meal in a while and managed not to look like a barbarian. 

Goldina went on. “Doctor Flesh Wound said that third operating room opened again, so we should be getting a pair of you back up to post-op. I’ll ask for volunteers tomorrow, so think it up. Other than that, we did great. And, Gina, I swear… Next time you ask a patient if they got injured in a knife fight, I will send you back to the Emergency.”

“But he’s name was Gianni, and he came from Manehattan!” She defended herself and then pouted to her food. “Fine.”

After that the dinner turned to friendly banter and not work-related conversation. They were mostly curious about Gilda but none of them bothered too much with the details of how she ended in her present situation. When the food was done they left. Some of them had an extra shift to do, but Gilda left the hospital to check her stand in the plaza.

No scones in sight, and the bowl for the money wasn’t empty.

It had a paper written ‘sucker’ on it.

She sat in the plaza, looking at the paper and internalized the message because she sure felt like one.

Damnit, what a fool-hardy, naïve idea. She should have known it wouldn’t work after what happened when she left the stand unattended when they took her to the militia HQ. Well, it wasn’t that bad… She would probably make some good money selling her scones to her new colleagues.

She grabbed her things and started on her way home.

If anything, the night provided a bit of a chill that she welcomed after all the work. The streets were mostly empty and the griffons that were outside weren’t the friendly kind. She felt a familiar sense of being put back in her place. She sighed to herself, carrying her stuff and her nurse hat. At least she wasn’t in Shatteredrock, neither was she looking for one of Gertrude and Grizelda’s would-be clients.

She shuddered.

But tomorrow would be another day and things looked up. Mostly. She could even hope that the mayor’s wife had forgotten about her by then.


	4. Lèse Majesté

A couple of days passed and, surprise, surprise, acquaintances turned to kind-of-friends she liked being with. Routine became a thing: bake and sell scones, miss the meeting and feel bad apologizing to Goldina, see patient, friendly banter, see another patient. Rinse and repeat until nineteen, dine and laugh at the stupid thing someone did, go home and sleep. On the third day she woke with the sound of thunder.

Right on time too, and actually rested. Maybe her mood improved over the days.

She got her scones baked, grabbed her purse, her nurse hat, her stand on her back and left for the plaza. The morning smelled of rain and she could hear a distant raging storm. Common enough for the weather team to build up the rainclouds in the distance, before moving them to the city and let them pour; and she wasn’t a specialist like Dash, but there was way too much lightning in that rain. She kept hearing distant thunder.

But it was not like she had time to waste worrying about clouds and rain.

She rushed past the griffons collecting trash. Griffonstone wasn’t always like that. It used to be a rich and proud city. It was the whole mess with the northerner holds that messed up the whole thing. And the Chancellor stealing money, political stuff she didn’t understand nor had the time to worry about. She supposed the things were connected.

But that day things were different. There were a lot of griffons in the plaza. It had the hospital, and the city hall, but it also had the Chancellor’s Palace and it seemed that the distant storm was a good analogy. There were thousands of griffons gathered, flooding the plaza, shouting insults and demanding the chancellor came out and faced them.

A particularly pissed off griffon lady threw a stone past the closed iron gates and scared the crap out of the militia griffons before the doors. “Come out and face us you pussy!”

“Hey, what is this about?” She asked the griffoness, a dark shade of yellow and her head was an off-white shade of tan.

“What? You don’t know?” She seemed surprised. “This asshole mobilized the entire Griffonian Standing Army and sent them to Snow Mountains. The only reason the unit spearheading the maneuver didn’t start this damn civil war already was because Lord Discord showed up and negotiated with the northerners. I have a brother in there!”

Oh… She had seen something about it in the newspapers. She just didn’t think it was that bad.

“It’s actually worse than that.” Another griffon told her, a white and black male that was just as angry. “They bypassed the Hall of Friendship in Canterlot. They meant to capture The Lion and bring him to be judged in here. Completely behind Princess Celestia’s back! This is treason! Princess Celestia said that The Lion can be made king and the chancellor just won’t let go! Everyone and their mothers know he’s stole ridiculous amounts of money from us, and now this! They won’t even talk about the other units and won’t admit to anything! I don’t want my nation in another stupid war!”

Gilda didn’t really care about the politics involved. All she knew was that this whole mess was the reason she was stuck without her pay and the Chancellor was to blame. But she also saw a griffon selling water bottles among the crowd and decided that she should sell her scones.

And what do you know, it actually worked! She sold all of them, after all, angry griffons needed food too and her scones might not be the best, but they were tasty enough. Her only regret was not knowing about that mess. She would’ve made a lot more scones!

Glad she had made some good money, despite all the wasted scones from last day, Gilda gleefully grabbed her things and went early to her job, and once she was identified as one of the nurses, the griffons that worked on security even let her put her things in a secluded place where they wouldn’t be disturbed. She even left her pouch with the money so that she didn’t have to carry all over. A nice nook under the stairs. Out of the way, and out of eyes.

Surprisingly, that day looked like it was going to be awesome!

She even got to eat a delicious stew with chuck steak, potatoes, carrots and onions, despite the fact that she was supposed to eat only once a day, the griffons there said it was alright for her to lunch and dine. No alternatives, but she really couldn’t see anyone deciding against that! Also, free food! And on top of it all, she made it to the meeting Goldina kept telling her about.

Nothing fancy, in the nurses’ room by the ward. They were all gathered there, and she had a few seconds exchanging pleasantries with the others.

Thus, Goldina didn’t take long before she arrived. “Hi Gilda! Nice seeing you here! I’m glad you’re with us because we got a doozy this afternoon! Details are obviously not for us, but it seems that the Royal Guards raided a museum that was a front for something shady and there was a fight in Thunderpeak. Lots of shooting, beating others over the head and magical stun sticks. The Royal Guard had many transferred over to us. A lot of patients that got interned for surgery and they’re all coming to our ward. As usual, I’ve drawn the patients around and I have assigned them to each one of us. The files of the ones involved in that incident have the numbers underlined in red. Standard rules apply and don’t talk to them too much. I’m talking to you, Gina.”

The ‘crazy one’ huffed at that, but things happened smoothly from there. Gilda didn’t waste time grabbing the files Goldina had for her and put them on a neat pile on the place in the table she just claimed for herself, then picked up the first. Some griffon guy called Grady. Thunderpeak local militia, got shot in the shoulder. Apparently, nothing too important got damaged, but the wound ought to be cleaned daily. A job for not-nurse Gilda.

She grabbed the stuff she’d need and went to the relevant room. Knocked on the door and an annoyed voice on the other side told her to enter. Past the door was a tan and white griffon, a big and fit guy, laying on his side with his head on the pillow and bored out of his mind judging by his unfocused stare. She supposed that working in the law enforcement he ought to be strong and fit. Looked kinda hot, laying like that, and he wasn’t even trying.

She coughed and focused on her task.

“Hi. I’m Gilda. I’m here to clean your wound. How are you feeling?” She kicked the door closed with her hindleg and the griffon’s voice came out as bored as he looked.

“Hi, Gilda. I’m just annoyed. Can you believe they transferred me here just because a bullet grazed my shoulder? I should be home with my kids and my wife… Come on!”

“Yeah, that sucks.” She said casually while she opened the bundle with her tools for the procedure over the nightstand, then she started carefully removing the dressing, careful not to pull too much at his fur. He was probably used to being in hospitals and such, just bored. Not to mention that he looked tough. “So, why did they send you here? Doesn’t Thunderpeak have its own hospital?”

She knew she wasn’t supposed to talk too much with him, but who cared, and the book said that she was supposed to be friendly anyways.

“Yeah… It’s complicated.” He grunted, more from annoyance than her pulling at his wound. “It’s on the border with Snow Mountains hold and Princess Luna was worried about some sort of retaliation. It’s all because of those damn northerners and because our mayor is too much of a wimp to take a stance against those savages. He’s all scared of The Lion and won’t side with our government already. It allowed all sorts of undesirables to get cozy in the city. Pisses me off!”

The wound didn’t look like something that even a big guy like him could shrug off casually and it was likely a good thing they sent him to the doctor. It had been cleaned as how the book said doctors would do to a gunshot wound. A bit bloody and watery in the middle of the stiches. It had a lot of clotted blood. Probably because he moved around too much.

Well, none of that was her business and she just cleaned it.

He kept talking though. “Feathering northerners had some sort of operation hidden in a museum. Can you believe it? But the worst is that the whole thing was a mess. Princess Luna just showed up with her Royal Guards and went in by herself. We only heard of it if because some griffons started freaking out over the shooting and called us. What a Celestia-damned mess!”

“Yeah, I think I understand.” She carefully rinsed the wound with the gauze in water and soap. “It wouldn’t hurt them to let you guys in, right?”

“Huh. Now that I think of it, maybe Her Highness worried someone inside the force would warn them. Like an infiltrated mole. I swear… Those pricks are everywhere! If Princess Celestia isn’t going to let Chancellor Gail deal with them, then she ought to do it herself.”

“Nice hospital though. Glad to see that the money we pay the Princess to watch over us turns into these neat royal hospitals.” He chuckled. “And some people want Griffonia to split with the ponies. What a load… Yeah... Maybe Gail is a corrupt jerk, but that solution is kicking him off the Chancellor’s Office and putting someone less dumb, not change the whole system and put a freaking king in his place. Lion's gonna want the title to be inheritable, and that is the least. We're just giving up on democracy, man.”

He sighed. “I mean… I know I’m not supposed to mention it… But… Heck… I miss the time the North was reasonable and got us that tasty game meat, even with all the drama the ponies raised about that. And those ass-kicking revolver muskets! I mean, put one of those in my paws with a decent bayonet and I’ll pluck The Lion’s feathers myself!”

“Yeah.” She agreed without really thinking while her mind was on her job of remaking the dressing. “He sounds like a prick.”

“You’re damn right he does! I’ll never understand how griffons can be so stupid to go all the way to the north and join him.”

That, of course, made her think of Grizelda and Gertrude. She hoped they were alright. Gertrude didn’t seem like the kind to make good decisions. Not that Gilda herself was… But she worried anyway.

With her job done, she grabbed everything and put the tray on her back. “All done. Get well.”

“Thanks Gilda.” He gave her a thumbs up. “You’re great at your job.”

She blinked and fidgeted with her paws a bit before thanking him and leaving as fast as her embarrassed self could manage. Outside there were two of the nurses staring at her. Crazy Gina and a pinkish one she hadn’t talked to yet.

“Sheesh, Gilda! What is the point of taking care of a big guy like that and not even feeling his muscles a little?” The first told her she and deadpanned with a grunt.

“I think I’m already in enough trouble as it is…”

“Aw, come on! Perks of the job, am I right?” She insisted and her friend started giggling with her while Gilda rolled her eyes and walked off towards the nurses’ room.

Time for the next patient!

Next one was a female earth pony that got admitted with some sort of lung fungus and had it removed. The doctor had already seen her, and all Gilda was supposed to do was clean the surgical wound. Hooray, routine!

[center]***[/center]

The day dragged on and Gilda lost count of how many patients she saw. The whole staff worked past their time along with the ones of the next shift. Dinner was a fond memory of a dream long gone and she was tired as heck. But she felt like things were going great!

Her present patient was in another floor of the same wing and was one of the guys involved in the shooting in Thunderpeak. Some old dude called Gabriel that had surgery on both his forepaws.

She reached a hall with the entrance to the right corridor and were relatives and patients that could walk would usually lounge around along the doctors taking a break and talking among themselves. It had a large canopy ceiling and it let visible the dark and clouded night sky. That storm had arrived in full force and the heavy rain castigated the glass, pounding incessantly with lightning and thunder every now and then.

It was funny seeing the ponies almost losing it at the loud thunder only to chuckle or smile awkwardly later, but she didn’t really care. She actually liked the sound but was tired and work would soon be over. 

The entrance of the proper corridor was blocked by a pair of thestral Royal Guards. The night guys, bat-ponies, that liked the Princess of the Night. It was very unusual to see them in Griffonstone when they were an even rarer sight than their gold-clad brethren anywhere in the world.

“Hey. I gotta see this guy…” She showed them the clipboard. “Gabriel. Gotta clean his wounds.”

One of the thestrals stared at the papers and nodded at the other, who spoke to her. “Right, ma’am. Please be mindful that he is a dangerous terrorist.”

She blinked at them. “What did he do?”

“We’re not at liberty to discuss this, ma’am. Please do your job as quickly as you can and leave him to us.”

“Yeah. Sure.” She frowned a little but went on her way down the corridor.

“Hey, Smokey! She’s cleared to see the Old Guy!” One of the two thestrals called and down the corridor another one of them waved that she had understood.

It was a young thestral, but she looked like she was ready and rearing for a fight if needed. She nodded at Gilda and opened the door for her. Then she closed it.

Inside was a typical room in the hospital. The wind and the rain threatened to break the glass in the window, but it held well enough. Laying on his back in the bed she saw the dangerous terrorist. An old gray headed griffon with his body covered by the sheets, but she could see his colors washing away due to age.

Geez. Some terrorist.

Walking closer she saw the dressing over the surgical wounds in his forepaws, all bloody and bulky as the others she had seem that day, fresh off the surgical center. He was rather big though. And seemed fitter than most griffons Gilda had known. In fact, he reminded her of the guy from the Thunderpeak militia, despite his age. Damn, this guy must’ve been a beast in his younger years.

She checked his file and it turned out he was a curator for a museum. The museum the Royal Guard raided? Holy feathers! Maybe he used to do some Daring Do shit to end up looking that that in his old age.

Anyways, she was there to clean his wounds, not to guess about his past or to gawk at him. She set to work under the insistent noise from the storm pelting the window and the occasional thunder.

His paws went through surgery and it seemed bad. Not that the wound was doing bad, but the injury that required surgery seemed bad. Then she noticed he had awakened but didn’t say anything or even move.

“Almost done, Grandpa.” She said as nicely as she could. He was staring at her though, and she didn’t really feel comfortable with it. “And stop staring like that. It’s freaking creepy.”

He did shift his eyes away and she focused on cleaning thoroughly through the stitches, hoping she wasn’t hurting him.

“Do you hear the storm?” He asked her casually, though with a serious voice.

“Yeah…” She focused on removing the blood clotted in between the saliences of his skin. “It’s raining buckets outside.”

She felt a little bad. It was probably an old guy just trying to strike a conversation. And he had been arrested… She kinda knew how that felt. “So, ponies tell me you’re under arrest and not to talk too much with you.”

She pulled the new dressage around his paw, after she was done with it. “What did an old dude like you do? Blew a raspberry at someone?”

“You are going to talk to me despite being told not to?”

She shrugged while she worked. “I wouldn’t be stuck with community service if I was good at following pony rules, now would I?”

He laughed and grinned. “I shot Princess Luna.”

She stopped her work and stared at him, then started laughing. “Dude! For real?”

“With a five-chambered, griffon-made high-caliber revolver. Enchanted bullets too, straight from the Stormvalley Armory. Didn’t work as I imagined, though.” He smiled at her again and she laughed too, but her eyes were drawn to his paws.

“Did she do this to you?”

He hummed and nodded. “Crushed my gun paw with a swing of a polearm and stabbed the other to the floor with a dagger. I don’t think the bullets even hurt her and her damn magic.”

“Damn.” Gilda tried imagining the awkward and generally reclusive princess doing something like that and failed. “I guess I would be pissed too if someone shot at me.”

“What about you?” He seemed genuinely curious. “Why are you here? Somehow I don’t think that you are enjoying what you’re doing.”

It’s not like she hated it or something. She sure liked it sometimes and also liked Goldina, but it was something she was forced to do, and she was tired. She grunted.

“I punched a jerk that tried to steal two Bits from me and ended up breaking his beak. It was a damn minor and the judge said I had to do community service or spend time in jail, and no fucking way I would be spending time in a damn jail. I was down for cloud duty with the pegasi, but that was taken, so I ended up taking care of the patients in the hospital.” She felt so frustrated in her compliance and putting it out for once was nice. Her face met her paws like she let off the frustration. “Even had to attend to a class about how to do this crap.”

“It is such a pony thing to punish others for defending what is theirs.” He frowned. “If it is worth anything to you, know that I would have done the same.”

Yeah. He would likely have killed that little jerk. “Yeah. Thanks grandpa. It’s not that bad. Most ponies are annoying, whining all the time that their everything is hurting, but it is easy enough. You at least sound like you’re cool.”

She shrugged. “And, at least I got to sell some of my scones in the morning before my shift. Couldn’t do that if I was in jail.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m stuck here the whole afternoon. I tried leaving the stand unattended, but they took the scones and didn’t leave the money, just a note telling me I’m a sucker. Of course.” She growled and her paws rose up as she contained the impulse to plain break something out of anger. It was good letting it out again. “The problem is that griffons are jerks!”

She felt like she shouldn’t but talking it out felt so good and liberating. “I mean… I did those things just as a hobby, but the damn Chancellor had all the southern holds drop the basic income because of the war effort, and now I barely make it month to month with the scones. I just hope I can last until the damn ponies in Canterlot get off their lazy flanks and fix this mess. There shouldn’t even be a war effort, but the damn princess must be too busy with some pony crap to notice that her feathering subjects aren’t getting their rights! I pay taxes every time I buy scone ingredients!”

“I pay damn taxes every time I pay for anything! I probably pay taxes when I pay taxes!” She growled. “And now, on top of it all, the damn mayor decided that all commerce needs to stop by nightfall because something, something war, something.”

He let her talk her problems out like he was the one supposed to take care of her. He paid attention and it was nice putting it. Being heard without being judged. It was a bit embarrassing, but he didn’t really give her time to think about it. “Your problem is not that griffons are ‘jerks’ either, kitty. Your problem is that you are living with the wrong griffons.”

What the heck. “Did you just call me kitty?”

“I mean no offense. What is your name, then?”

“Gilda.” She growled at him. Almost regretted telling him all that.

“Your problem, Gilda, is that your race has been living under subjugation from an old enemy for so long you don’t even remember that you are a prisoner anymore or even what it feels like to be free.”

“Yeah, sorry. I’m not interested in your griffon pride spiel. I got more important things that I need to care just to stay out of trouble.” She really didn’t care. King, chancellor… It was just some dude that wanted to get rich on her money and neither would care about her problems. Yes, she knew where he was going with that conversation and it didn’t interest her any more than it already didn’t when she heard Gertrude going on about it. “I know this stuff, and it’s wrong. I have pony friends, dude. It’s not the ponies, it’s some weirdoes that want to feel special about themselves.”

“Listen to yourself, Gilda.” He didn’t seem impressed. “You have no means of self-support other than what money the government pays you. This is a pony thing. They are the ones that implemented the universal basic income, but now that things aren’t going the way they wanted, they took it away. The Princess, quite literally, pays griffons to behave.”

“This is not right!” She did her best not to let her agitation show. “It’s the Griffon Chancellor that messed things up. He’s the one that ordered the territories to stop it and retained the money for the war effort.”

“But this is part of the problem: The Chancellor doesn’t rule for us. He rules for Celestia. And do you see why he did it?” Was he saying that Princess Celestia actually approves what Chancellor Gail did? That was, sending an army to the north… Maybe even stealing all he did. Or maybe she turned a blind eye to it because the Chancellor was useful to her? “Because he is doing Celestia’s bidding. They want the one that is fit to rule the griffons, for the griffons, gone.”

She was confused. She imagined that all Gail wanted was more money. Was there an ulterior motive? Even worse, something Princess Celestia is doing, using the griffon chancellor? What the heck! “The Chancellor needs the money to pay for his soldiers?”

He chuckled. “No, kitty. He needs you. Your brothers and sisters. He did it so that the griffons that embraced Celestia’s ideals would starve until they joined his army. You’ll notice that everything Celestia has done to us will work perfectly as long as you are compliant. As long as you violate your true nature and remain docile.”

“My true nature?” She wondered.

“Have you ever seen a griffon using their claws to do a job the ponies have given them?”

She didn’t answer. Instead, her eyes found the floor and she let her wings sag. She spent her whole life thinking that she was some badass that made her own rules and lived the way she wanted. But he had just told her that not only she played right into the system that Princess Celestia used to control griffons. But… Celestia was nice, wasn’t she? Everyone liked her. Could it be that everyone was being fooled and only those griffons in the north understood what was going on?”

Gilda would be pissed if that was the case, but that was such a convenient thing for them to say. But… Still, it would make sense if Gail was actually working with Celestia.

She stared at the griffon and he studied her while she struggled with his words and her own thoughts. Then his eyes, narrowed and he spoke in a low voice, like sharing a secret.

“There is a city, far in the north. Where griffon lands meet the Frozen North. Holy Griffindel, in the Valley of Griffons. Most ancient of griffon cities, it was built before the Windigos were unleashed upon us, and she housed the mightiest Lords of the Sky, before the pegasi, before the sun and the moon.”

She listened quietly. “It is the birthplace of our race, full of history. Full of pride. It is a journey every griffon should make at least once. Beware though… Most that go do not return because they find their true selves, staring at her black gates where the Conqueror fell before the Dawnbringer.”

“Who is the Conqueror?” What the heck was he talking about and in that weird way? “What is with talking like that?”

“You’ll learn in time. In there resides your future king. Lord Gilad Ironfeathers.”

“The Lion?” She blinked.

“And his mate. The most important griffon to ever exist. Lady Gwendolen. The most beautiful, the wisest. Listen and open your heart to her. It will change your life forever.”

She shook her head. That guy had to be going crazy! “That is the most inhospitable place in the world. How am I supposed to go there when I can barely pay my bills?”

She didn’t even know if she could leave the city… She’d get her ass dragged to Shatteredrock.

“If you want change, you must change. Ask yourself… Are you happy with your life? Life-changing decisions are difficult and require much. You may have to throw yourself at an abyss and believe that there is one who will hold you. I have done the same. And She caught me in my darkest hour.”

He wasn’t wrong in that, though. But Gilda thought that the big change that she could do in her life was trying to learn something out of that whole experience. Then again, she wasn’t aware that Celestia was screwing harmless little her and the crazy griffons from the north might have the right idea.

“Meet my daughter, Gerdie, in Haybale. She may have left already, but you were made to thrive in the adversity. When you do find her tell her that I sent you. She will ask you my name, and it is Gabriel. She will then ask you if you can hear the storm. You must answer, exactly, ‘I can hear Her cry’.”

She nodded, listening intently. But what the heck? Was that some sort of code? Like one of those dumb books Rainbow’s unicorn friend liked to read?

That moment a thestral pony, another one of Luna's guards opened the door and walked into the room holding a sandwich in his mouth, which he dropped, so surprised he was to see her. “Hey, this guy is under arrest. You're not supposed to be talking to him!”

Gilda just stared at the bat-pony. Sounded like the princesses didn’t want her to listen to that old guy, alright. “Sorry, girl. You gotta go if your job is done.”

She didn’t like getting ordered around like that and that stupid pony with that lisp sure seemed sketchy. Some royal guard that never showed up unless it was to mess with the locals, like Princess Luna invading some museum and fucking up an old guys’ paws.

“I’m going.” She said and gathered the small tray with what remained of the cleaning supplies. She squinted her eyes at the pony on her way out, and he didn’t seem to understand, but didn’t bother asking either.

She left and rushed back to the nurses’ room. She found Goldina with what looked like a mountain of work to be done in the form of reports. She seemed like such a hard-working griffon.

“Hey, Gilda. All done?” She smiled at her.

“Yeah. I’m done.” She left the files on the table.

“You can take the day off tomorrow.” Goldina told her, signing something.

That surprised Gilda and she blinked a few times before she actually understood. “What... I don’t think that I can. I mean… I’m on probation. I don’t want to piss off the authorities.”

That old griffon’s words kept reverberating inside her head and the more she thought about it, the more she was unsure of what she should do. What if Goldina was in on it, or something. Like… She was too nice. Or maybe she was genuinely a nice griffon, like Greta.

“It’s okay, Gilda. You’re not the first.” Goldina giggled. “It is within my attributions to reward your hard work this way. Not to mention, you won’t be too useful to anyone if you’re too tired. You guys did a great job today, and we won’t be getting new patients tomorrow since our ward is closed to new admissions with this whole mess with the patients from Thunderpeak. I’ll be giving the others half-period tomorrow, so don’t feel too special.”

Gilda chuckled. “Then, I’ll see you after tomorrow!”

Well, that did improve her mood until she was by the hospital’s front door and realized that she would have to go home in that storm. It poured like there was no tomorrow.

“Oh well…” She sighed to herself looking at the empty plaza with all that pooled water. “It’s just a little rain.”

She could even get some rest tomorrow since her scones sold that well in the morning and she was free in the afternoon. She probably wouldn’t rest, but would bake more scones and go there to sell them… The point was that it was fine.

“Ma’am, you can leave those in here if you want.” The security guy for the hospital’s entrance told her when she went to grab her stand and the rest. Some normal looking guy with tan fur and a yellowish head wearing a ‘Security’ black cap. “I know you. I saw you in there selling your scones. And I mean… This stuff isn’t bothering anyone.”

“Thanks.” She smiled at him and he nodded, holding his cap before going back to his post by the entrance. The water might ruin it, so she left her stand and her nurse hat but took the pouch with her money. It was all there too.

Not much left to think about. She walked out of the building under the storm. The rain came down hard and cold. Not much point in running as she’d be soaked when she got home anyway. Flying in the wind would be dangerous.

Not a soul outside, not even the poor griffons trying to scrape a living off junk. Most houses shone lights out their windows and she could, see griffons inside going about their daily routine as much as the rain permitted. Seeing families, made her wonder if she had made a mistake deciding that she wanted to live alone. Sure, she liked the freedom and the space she had for herself but living with someone else would certainly make those times easier to live through.

Or maybe it was just the annoyance of her wet fur and feathers bothering her and talking nonsense in her head. She was going to make it even with that irritating problem that was her whole interaction with the legal system. At least she found some great and nice griffons in the hospital where she would be working for some time.

And at least the rain would clean the cobblestone streets and wash the smells away. She couldn’t remember the damn city smelling that bad in all of her life.

Surprisingly, there were some griffons out and there seemed to be some sort of party with a huge bonfire up ahead. The crazy old lady that lived in front of her was probably freaking out at some idiot lighting a bonfire on their front yard or something.

Speaking of her, she came running at Gilda, all flustered about whatever was happening. Honestly, Gilda always thought she was just an annoying crazy old lady that wouldn’t ever have the drive to come out of her house and run towards someone to complain about anything.

She was an old, all greyed out lady with small glasses and a navy-blue scarf that could barely move faster than walking speed, coming towards Gilda in that harsh rain. It even made Gilda feel bad for her.

“Hello, Miss Gemma. Should you be outside with this rain?” She smiled at the old lady.

“Gilda! Dear! Your house is on fire!” She screamed.

Gilda’s first reaction was a shocked chuckle. How could anything be on fire with that freaking storm pouring water over everything? There was no way her house was on fire!

Then she couldn’t hold her anxiety, after some second and half of hearing the news and broke into frantic flight until she arrived at the front yard, surrounded with griffons staring and doing nothing while the actual firefighters did try something, hosing water inside through the windows when something cracked and two of them ran from inside the house. Gilda arrived just in time for the second floor to crash down and shower embers everywhere.

There was a loud noise, but she screamed and wasn’t really paying attention to details. “My house!”

“My house…” A whine escaped her. Everything she had, but the stupid stand, somehow, burned in one of the worse storms the city had ever seen. How did that even happen? Her house! It wasn’t much, but it was hers. The last thing she had that mom had left for her.

“Ma’am, did you live in this house?” A cyan male griffon came to her, wearing the red hat of the firefighters and looking rather sorry, covered in a mixture of water and soot.

“Yeah… I guess I did.” She sighed.

“I’m terribly sorry, ma’am. Something inside caused the fire and weakened the structure.” He avoided her gaze. “We did what we could. I’m sorry.”

Wait! Her house was insured! Yes! It wasn’t over yet! She paid thousands of Bits in insurance over the years! It was going to be alright! “I'll go to my friend's house… Take a bath and then, in the morning, go see the insurance company.”

“Oh. That is a bit of good news then. Take care, ma'am.” He nodded his hat. “We'll be here in the morn and see if we can find some clue to what caused the fire. You should visit our headquarters. We may have something for you in a few days.”

“Thanks.” She grinned the best she could. Even if things were going to be fine and she didn’t feel like she had reason to despair, she had still lost her house. Maybe she was trying to be optimistic, but maybe, just maybe, she might even get a better house with the insurance money. 

But that was a thought for tomorrow. Right then she needed to get out of that stupid rain, and it was not like one of those jerks she lived close by would offer her a place to stay. Fortunately, Gilda had someone she could depend on.

[center]***[/center]

A quick trot took her to the nicer, richer part of the town. Not that the griffons that lived there were actually rich, merely better in life than Gilda was in that moment. Nicer houses, but still under the same damn rain. The one she looked for was a pretty one, all white with a greenish roof and a nice grassy lawn, complete with a small stone path to the door.

Unfortunately, it had no cover and she still stood on the rain while she knocked. Damn thing was getting cold.

Fortunately, it didn’t take long for someone to open the door. Greta’s husband, a nice looking cyan and white griffon, but he gave her a rather disinterested glance despite her grinning at him. It took him a few moments before he recognized her. She must look like shit; so tired and soaked in that damn rain.

“Oh my gosh! Gilda! Come in!” He freaked and came out of the way, gesturing for her to get inside and Gilda wasted no time in doing just that, dripping on the nice gray-green carpet. But Mister Gary didn’t mind.

“I'm sorry to disturb, Mister Gary. But…” She started, but he didn’t let her finish.

“Don’t say a thing, Gilda.” The house was rather spacious, with the living and dining rooms in the same area as the kitchen, with a staircase in the middle that led to a raised living area towards which he shouted. “Greta! Bring a towel! Hurry!”

She appeared on the second floor, squeaked, and seconds later flew down the mezzanine bringing said towel on her beak that she promptly delivered to Gilda, who felt like a burden, but wasn’t prepared to decline.

“Goodness sake, did something happen for you to be out in this storm?” Her friend fussed about trying to help her get dry and it just made Gilda feel worse to impose. She was used to thinking herself as so independent and awesome.

Well, it wasn’t her fault, even if she suspected the mayor's wife and their kid, none of that mess was actually her fault! That was… Punching the kid was, but that wasn’t the point.

“I had just come home from work… It burned… My house caught on fire, somehow.”

“Goodness!” Her friend gasped. “Will you be alright?”

“I suppose insurance is finally going to be worth something, right?” She chuckled and it hurt her chest, bringing her the realization of just how tired she was. She ached everywhere and felt generally miserable. Stupid rain. At least she had her friends. Well, her friend Greta and her husband, because Dash was miles away.

Surely, Rainbow Dash and her friends would help, but reaching out to Dash was a lot harder because Dash… Well, Rainbow Dash was Rainbow Dash, and it wasn’t very likely that Gilda could pay for the teleporter fee, much less travel all the way to Ponyville. And she also probably had her own issues to deal with.

No, she was stuck with Greta and her husband and she was damn grateful the two of them didn’t kick her out.

“Wait, did you say that you had come home from work?” Greta blinked a bit surprised. Gilda supposed she would be.

“Well, not really job… I mean… I got into trouble with the law. I punched a jerk that stole some scones from me, and I went a bit too hard on him. I broke his beak and now I gotta do community work at the hospital.” For some reason telling them that was easier than she had thought, but her cheeks burned. She was ashamed. They had such a nice life, with a nice home and good, decent jobs. She felt so inferior. Even Rainbow Dash had a job.

Actually, she had a job: baking scones. It just wasn’t that hot of a job. She had to remind herself that she was simply in a bad spell and that things would be great again.

“I can’t believe this, Gilda…” It was funny. Like she was her mother, or something, but Greta wasn’t angry or anything, but she wasn’t happy either. “I can’t believe this! You ought to know better!”

“Yeah, I know.” Gilda Looked at the carpet sheepishly. “I screwed up bad this time.”

Then Greta scratched the back of her head, thoughful, while her husband looked at them and she sighed. “Let’s get you settled in. You can stay in the guest room and we were going to dine soon. You can stay with us until you get a new place. Alright? Or until you get this while mess sorted out.”

She said that, but she looked past Gilda at her husband and Gary startled a little. “Oh! Yeah! I mean, you got insurance, right?”

“At least that I do.” Gilda grinned a little.

“See? We’ll figure this out, just like that.” He snapped his fingers and grinned. “I mean, it’s not standard practice at work, but I’ll talk with the guys in the city hall to see if we can’t fast track your money. I mean, it’s a bit awkward since you’re on probation, but I could vouch for you and that should speed up the process.”

What? She just stared at him in what she assumed was the dumbest way a griffon ever stared at another. Greta giggled and explained.

“Gary works with insurance in the Mayor’s Office.” She gave Gilda a big smile. “Insurance is in the city hall too.”

“Thanks, Gary. I never knew.” Maybe she was tired, but she felt like she should be happier after hearing that.

Anyways, whatever Greta was cooking in the kitchen smelled great. After a nice dinner with friends, she’d catch some Z’s and, in the morning, she would do her part with insurance. Hopefully, Gary would get her money in no time and she could get out of their feathers.


	5. Reverie

Gilda woke in a strange crystal room. A soft light radiated from the walls, ceiling and floor. There was a door, but it was closed. She blinked a few times, not because of the light, but because of the weird feeling that something was dead wrong. She simply sat there, in the middle and couldn’t remember anything after going to sleep.

Outside it rained. It poured down from the sky, with thunder every now and then with lightning that caused the crystal to flash and return to normal. Then she heard something else. A distant cry. Not like a baby, but like a large bird that ‘howled’ furiously. Claws scratched at the other side of a door and it banged against its frame. Nowhere to be seen, though. Like an angry creature tried to get in but couldn’t.

Had she actually heard anything? She wasn’t so sure anymore and looked around at the strange crystal walls. She scratched her head. What a strange place. Strange sensations.Then she noticed she wasn’t alone. Sitting in front of her was the one and only Princess Luna, the big, blue and blueberry smelling alicorn princess that was responsible for the night.

What the hell?

“Princess? Princess Luna? That you?” Just… What the hell?

“Greetings! You are Gilda, correct?” The big pony smiled at her and she looked at a weird blue crystal slab like she read something out of it. “Pleased to meet you! I mean, not really ‘meet’ you… We have met many times in the past, in your childhood, but you get my meaning.”

“What the heck is going on?” What was the alicorn so nervous about? That whole thing was so bizarre! She felt like time had stopped, somehow, and she was plucked from her life, put in that room to talk with the big blue weirdo. And what a strange sensation… Like she was forgetting something important.

“I’m sorry, Gilda.” Luna said with her ears hanging from her head in a sad apologetic stare. “I pulled you out of a particularly nasty nightmare.”

Oh! That was what that was… Gilda had stopped with the nightmares after she had grown up and she was convinced that nightmares were a pony thing. The whole thing was weird though, not at all how she remembered it. Luna would enter her dream and talk to her about whatever was scaring her. Not meet her in that strange room.

As though she read her thoughts, Luna spoke once more. “Again, I’m sorry. This isn’t normal… It got so out of hoof I had to get rid of the whole thing and erase the whole state your mind found itself in. Then I needed a place to situate your mind for it to form a consciousness so that we could talk. This is what this place is.”

The door she didn’t know where it was banged again, and a shrill cry echoed through Gilda’s head, above the storm outside. Did the princess not hear that? It didn’t seem like she did.

That notwithstanding, old Gabriel’s words came back to her thoughts.

_“Your problem, Gilda, is that your race has been living under subjugation from an old enemy for so long you don’t even remember that you are a prisoner anymore or even what it feels like to be free.”_

As though a siren had gone off deep inside, a red, flashy and noisy alarm that she should not trust the blue pony.

Luna, meanwhile, frowned at her slab of crystal and then Gilda could swear she heard laughter. A haunting female voice echoed inside her head, and she felt cold, like the wind from the a cold night descended on her, but it was more comforting than she expected.

A ghostly voice, female and haunting crept into her ears. She chanted words Gilda didn’t know, but it was as beautiful as it was mesmerizing. Somehow, she understood the meaning, even if she didn’t recognize the words from another language.

_A mighty beast in My likeness;_

_A caged, proud and hurt lioness._

_Throwing herself at the silver bars;_

_Held by the magic that moves the stars._

_A toast to you, My Child, reborn afresh;_

_What did you dream of?_

_What reveries escape the grasp of the Night Made Flesh?_

What was she dreaming of? Luna did say she plucked her out of a nightmare. Just a bad dream, right?

“What was I dreaming of, Princess Luna?” Gilda asked, innocently enough.

The princess stared up from her crystal slab but kept looking back at it. It distracted her. “Nothing important. It seems that you have been under a lot of stress lately. It got to you and it affected your dreams. There is also this storm. The thunder and lightning do weird things to some griffon minds. Nothing you need to worry yourself about, though. You seem to have a few subconscious strings floating up, but I got this under control.”

 _“Do you hear the storm?”_ Gabriel’s voice echoed inside her again, with the shrill scream of an eagle in counterpoint to a loud rumbling thunder. She could swear she heard laughter.

Luna's horn shone in blue after that, and Gilda didn’t know what she did, but the storm, Gabriel's voice and the haunting female voice were all gone along with the cold and that weird subjective feeling that something was wrong.

“Hum…” The confused pony princess blinked at Gilda. “Do you… This may sound weird, but do you hear something? Do you feel cold?”

Gilda smiled friendly. “Nothing at all, princess.”

“Huzzah!” The Princess cheered. “Success! Do you need any assistance? You were quite stressed a while ago. It seems some life event got into your dreams and it wasn’t pretty. It roused some weird fantasies, you know?”

There was her financial situation and burned house. The fear that some powerful politicians might be targeting her and that she could actually be in danger… But there was also the distant warning that all that paled in comparison to the magical mind-bending eldritch horror in front of her.

“I’m sure it was just the rough day at work, Princess.” Gilda spoke all friendly.

“Well, then…” Luna’s horn shone again, and she gave Gilda a cute plush doll in her likeness. “This charm will tell Tantabus to call me if there is something wrong. Okay? You should wake now. See you later, and good luck with your job.”

The Princess was gone, but Gilda didn’t wake. The Crystal grew dark and a strange foreboding sensation took hold of her. Something wasn’t right. She looked at the cute doll in her paw. It was a cute representation of the helpful Princess of the Night to keep her safe from the bad dreams, complete with shinny mane, fluffy wings and cute smile.

It was a piece of eldritch magic the alicorn abomination left ingrained in between the processes of Gilda's mind to warn her if it did anything it wasn’t supposed to.

Time had no meaning, and she might as well have spent an eternity looking down at the cute doll. Her entire existence came down to the simple choice of holding on to the endearing symbol that the Princess of the Night watched over her dreams or getting rid of the horrifying magical device that communicated the workings of her mind to Luna’s minion.

She sat on the razor edge of one simple and binary choice: keep the enchanting sign of Luna's dutiful dedication to protecting her dreams, or relinquish the alien alicorn magic made to spy the innards of her self.

The Princess could easily solve Gilda's problems.

The Mare With The Mane Made Of The Night would smother away whatever Her Sister decided made Gilda too dangerous for her little ponies.

It came down to one simple choice, and she slowly opened her paw. It balanced on the palm for a second, but the doll tumbled over towards the crystal floor.

 _“Do you hear the storm?”_ Thunder rumbled again.

“I can hear Her cry.” She muttered to herself.

The thunderous storm stirred louder and she surrendered to slumber to the creaking of a heavy door opening.

***

Morning came fast. Gilda must’ve been so tired she was gone as soon as she dropped on the bed. The tasty dinner, nice bath and sturdy roof certainly helped. She hurried to wash the sleep off her face and then to the breakfast table with her friends. Greta served some tasty prench toasts and Gary did the coffee.

She wanted to help, but… ‘Guest’.

“Did you sleep well, Gilda?” Greta asked all worry while Gary buttered one of his toasts and Gilda tasted the coffee. “I swear I heard you thrashing in the night. Maybe crying.”

“Come now, Greta.” Her husband stared nonchalantly at her. “Gilda is not a child.”

She stared at Greta too, munching on her toast, but shook her head with no recollection of even a dream. “Nah. Slept like a baby! Damn comfy bed you have on your guest room.”

“Oh, well. That is better, I suppose. Do you have plans for today?”

“Not much I can do… Gotta go see to this mess.” Gilda shrugged. Seeing a solution to her problem and with the support of her friends, everything seemed so much simpler.

The politicians targeting her… Well, she was sure she was just being paranoid and that the militiagriffon the other day was too. Judge Gracey was scary, but Gilda was sure she wasn’t corrupt or anything. Come on… He was her kid. Probably some dweeb with mommy issues.

“It's not that bad.” Gary smiled. “The department of insurances is in the Mayor’s Office, in the City Hall, right next to the Chancellor's palace in the main plaza. I’ll walk you there. I just can’t hold your paw, but you should get through the system no problem. If something crops up we’ll work it out with my help. You got a safe place to stay until this whole mess blows over.”

“Well, your mood certainly seems to have improved too!” Greta giggled all happy for her.

Suddenly, Gilda felt all too conscious of her situation, again, and she remembered just how screwed she would be without them. She hated that sensation of burning cheeks and general uneasiness. “I just don’t know what to say, guys. I hate to be a burden, but…”

Damn stinging eyes…

“It’s alright, Gilda.” Greta put a friendly paw on her shoulder and her touch just made everything better. “We’re friends.”

Her husband just nodded while he munched on his toast. It was so weird seeing griffons chew.

***

They left the house together and in a great mood. It was a cloudy and suffocatingly wet and hot day. It appeared that storm wasn’t done yet and it was most uncommon. But the guys in the weather department certainly knew what they were doing. Despite that, they walked together and in high moods most of the way until Greta’s job took her on another path. Then Gilda was alone with Gary, but it was alright because he was a great guy that kept talking about how great he thought Greta was, and well… Gilda had to agree. She only wondered if someone, someday, would talk about her like that.

It was a bit disheartening that she had just started to realize that she wasn’t the badass independent tough girl she thought of herself. Maybe there was space for some adjustments in her life. All in all, maybe the whole problem with the mayor’s kid was going to turn out into some good for her. Maybe she could even actually go to nursing school. Who knew?

There would be time to think about that later.

They arrived in the central plaza where Gilda’s life seemed to gravitate towards lately. Grover’s statue drew attention as soon as one arrived and behind it was the Chancellor’s Palace. Many militiagriffons standing guard in the area with all the mess of angry griffons that took the place last day. She doubted that the issues had been resolved, so it was obvious that it was the strong arm of the state that kept the plaza clear that morning.

Not very endearing a thought, but at least she had a clear path to her destination, the City Hall right next to the Chancellor’s Palace. Next to it was a giant mural that commemorated Griffonia’s adhesion to the Equestrian Confederation. She had never paid too much attention to it. It was just another piece of ‘history’ that she felt had no real impact in her life and was there just to celebrate some event that benefited some rich jerks and screwed the masses, in which she was included.

That day she stopped and stared at it.

King Grover, all high and mighty with reds, purples and gold, not to mention holding a chalice (that one) and a crown, along with a sword strapped to his side. He bumped his closed fist with Celestia’s hoof, and her sister stood next to her. In the background a large city that was a representation of Griffonstone and in foreground a crowd of ponies and griffons cheering. A beautiful blue sky with the sun and the moon that shone golden and silver rays down on them.

Not a bird. Not a cloud. Not a mountain. Not an animal. Nothing but the city, the rulers, and the people.

_And the symbol of The Sisters’ power._

Something about that mural deeply disgusted her, but she couldn’t put her claw on it. She frowned and pierced the details. Celestia’s golden adornments, Luna’s black ones. Grover’s crown. The… Wait… The Idol of Boreas wasn’t a chalice.

She looked closely, and there it was. The idol. Not a chalice. Why did she think it was a chalice? It kinda looked like a chalice, but she saw the actual thing once and even in that mural it wasn’t a chalice. Why did she think of a chalice?

_Wake up, My Child. They lied to you!_

Other than that, it occurred to her that the thing had nothing to do with the Kingdom of Griffonia joining the ponies and their confederation. Why did they even show the Idol in the mural? It helped Grover unite the griffons, much earlier than they joined the Confederation. Maybe they wanted to reinforce that it was with the idol that he united the griffons?

“Gilda?” She heard his voice, but it sounded distant and unimportant. She remembered something much more important than whatever it was Greta’s husband was going to say.

_Remember! Memories so powerful etched into your soul. Nor death or the Mistress of the Mind could steal them away._

She couldn’t remember when, or where precisely, but there was a tent erected in the middle of a dry and hot desert, burning under the sun. A pavilion with silks and satin above a saddle arabian green and golden rug. A small censer stood next to her emitting the aroma of sandalwood. She lounged comfortably on the rug next to many other beautiful and strong griffonnesses of varying ages.

She, and the others stared at a large and powerful griffon, all brown and tan with serious orange eyes walking on the rug, wearing a bronze armor, and a golden crown above his head.

The desert air remained still but she heard chanting. A large crowd banged something and chanted. Sounded like a mob banging stuff. Or was it an army? She didn’t look, but she was sure two armies met there. One puny and pathetic, the other mighty and invincible.

“Traitor King! Traitor King! Doing the Dawnbringer’s bidding, hiding under her wing.” They chanted on and on, mocking and laughing in coarse voices above the banging of shields.

It was rather childish and energetic. It drew her into joining in a low, giggly, and mocking tone with a seductive voice she used to mock the weakling males. The others around her giggled and joined. Her opinion was important, for some reason, and she knew her mocking leering pierced his stone exterior and hurt him inside.

Ignoring her and the others, he stopped in front of a tall throne set on the rug, under the shade. It was made of black iron, gold and steel, supporting a massive, mostly unremarkable, griffon of brown colors and a white head with a crown made of sky-bound spikes, made of iron and above hard, cruel, brown eyes. His bronze-like talon clicked on the armrest next to a chalice made of bone, gold, white gold and diamonds.

Surrounding the throne was a host of other griffons siting and silently judging the armored griffon. Worst of all was the tall and fit griffonness with metallic pink colors and wearing a multicolored cape with her white longsword on her back and a white gold diadem in her head. Her disapproving stare would’ve melted a steel ingot. Behind the throne two diamond dogs, bound in chains, fanned the area with large leaves. A saddle arabian pony, yellow and orange, had an iron collar and stood nearby, next to a table with food and drinks, trying to look invisible next to a pair of beautiful, pearlescent-white hippogriffs that seemed lost between despair and hopelessness.

The griffon in the throne rose his paw in a relaxed gesture for silence and all the chanting stopped.

“Kinda cool, isn’t it?” Gary spoke next to her and Gilda was back staring the mural. “Can you imagine how different things would be if we hadn’t joined the ponies? I mean, an independent Griffonia without the help from the rest of the world… I mean, I suppose that the other nations could trade with us and all that, but I doubt that they’d care about us the same way the pony princesses do.”

“Yeah…” Gilda agreed in a low voice. The dry, hot wind still washed over her. “It’s pretty cool.”

What the hell was that? She was going crazy, that was what! All she needed after all that mess she had gotten herself into. Well, she was so screwed she didn’t have the time to worry about her mental health anymore!

“So, where am I supposed to go?” She turned to Gary and he grinned all agreeable excitement. She supposed he was happy he got to help, or something. Such a nice guy. No wonder Greta had married him.

He pointed one of the buildings. “The insurances office, in the city hall. It is on the ground floor, the east wing. Can’t miss it. I’ll be working there, so I can take you all the way. I just can't… You know… Work with you. Boss wouldn’t like it, but there is nothing keeping me from giving your paperwork the fast lane.”

He winked at her and she chuckled. “Alright! Thanks a lot dude. I’d be lost without you guys.”

“That’s what friends are for Gilda! Come on!”

She followed him into the building, no problems there. It was the same she went for her job. It even had the same griffon reading the newspaper in the information table. He gestured for her to follow and pointed the right queue to a clerk window in the corridor while he went into the offices.

So, Gilda sat in the floor and waited along with the other griffons in the queue. Considering that they were there to talk about insurance, the vexed expressions and lack of friendly banter didn’t surprise her at all. She supposed the storm must have caused a lot of trouble.

Of course, few houses must’ve burned in the middle of a freaking storm…

So, the time passed, and the minutes turned into a whole hour (they had a clock hanging from the ceiling to remind them of how much time of their life they had wasted in that place) when a commotion drew attention from the queue and griffons, herself included, bent to the side to see what the commotion was.

It was a big griffon girl. Almost an adult, but she was huge. All white and gray on her head she scratched at the floor while four. Four! Big militiagriffons struggled to drag her out.

“The day of reckoning comes!” She cried in a panicked frenzy. “The Wheel of Time spins unstopping and he who finds himself in power will find that he is thus powerless! Under the Sun and Moon you have forgotten the harsh mountain where She has birthed your ancestors and hoofed blood runs in your veins!”

“Oh, for crying out loud! Get her under control!” One of the griffons in the local militia grunted and cried when she kicked him away at the nearest wall. That guy wouldn’t be getting up and would be spending the next year learning how to walk again if not for the protective spells in his barding.

Gilda grimaced and the others around her gasped and recoiled at the spectacle as two of the griffons trying to hold the big female poked her on the back and behind the head with the pink-tipped magical stun batons. She barely felt it, even when the pink sparks flew.

The big griffoness reached for the ones in the queue, in Gilda’s general direction and caused griffons to recoil and gasp. “Open your eyes! Wake up! There is still time! Repent and cover yourselves in ashes of birch trees that the Allmother will forgive you!”

“Settle down, will you?!” One of the militiagriffons roared and jumped on top of her, hitting he back of her head with the baton twice.

The big griffon cried. Not like crying in pain, but she cried like a furious eagle and stood on her hindlegs. Powerful and elegant body moving like lightning, she grabbed the militia officer and threw her to the floor with her left forepaw. Her right slashed straight through the magically enchanted leather armor and blood flew everywhere.

Griffons in the line started panicking and it only got worse as the stun batons didn’t seem to work until one of the griffons in the militia drew his wheellock pistol and shot at her. All three of them shot her and she finally collapsed and turned on her back, still mumbling and trying to move until they hit her with the batons a few more times. She didn’t seem injured, though, other than small burn marks on her fur. They probably shot her with enchanted crystal balls. If Gilda remembered correctly, local militias couldn’t load their guns with real ammunition, only crystal balls with stun spells.

Maybe it was the stress of the situation, but Gilda felt bad for her and hoped she wasn’t conscious anymore. Maybe that was what they called empathy. Griffon ladies had tender and sensitives parts in their belies that they didn’t usually like exposed, and that was without even mentioning her other lady bits. In her place Gilda would’ve felt so exposed and vulnerable. Or maybe it was the fact that she might be going crazy too, with her ‘vision’ or whatever that was a while back.

“Right. Show’s over! Quit staring you creeps!” One of the griffons with the militia, the one that got kicked into a wall, barked at the present griffons while the others recovered. Older than the others, all tan and yellow. “Get her outside. They’re waiting to take her to the hospital.”

He kept talking while he helped the one that got slashed to her feet. “You okay Gris?”

“Fuck!” She grunted and staggered, holding a bloody paw to the cut in her armor. To be honest, the girl seemed even more scared than the onlookers. “That freaking crazy clawed me through the armor. What the fuck!”

“That’s drugs for you.” He helped her walk with what must have been a nasty gash on her chest. “We’re getting you to the hospital. Come on.”

Gilda simply stood with the others, too stunned to do anything while they hurriedly carried the big griffonness outside. Finally, a gray and white griffon male, wearing reading glasses, came out of the office and apologized. “Everyone, please remain calm. We’re resuming work so that nobody’s process gets hindered. Everyone will be served. Just remain calm. It was just some poor girl with issues.”

‘Issues’? She almost killed a griffon from the local militia with her bare talons, took a beating and got shot multiple times with magic made for putting you out of commission before she stopped! Better not to make a scene though.

“Psh…” An old griffon lady next to her harumphed. “Drugs. They say that about anyone that gives them a little trouble. Some griffons go kinda crazy because of these storms. It’s been getting worse over the years, I tell you.”

It was a small and old griffon lady with a metallic sheen to her gray coat and blueish head. She even wore a small little hat with a delicate orchid on it. Looking angrily at the militiagriffons dragging the big griffoness out.

“But nobody cares. Even went to Canterlot with my case study and Princess Celestia couldn’t get her head out of her ass.” She mumbled something. “Some griffons are just dangerous, indeed. Feathering dumbass.”

“Excuse me?”

The older griffon sighed. “Sorry sweetie. I get a bit moody in the morning.”

“No. You know something?” Gilda insisted. Might be that she would be the next one…

“Worked as psychiatrist in the Griffonstone Hospital for the most of my life. I kept seeing this. Some griffons just got angrier and meaner when the ponies pulled these thunderstorms. Actually, my research convinced the weather department to tone them down.”

That was the first time she had ever heard of that. “What happens to them?”

“Well, they just can’t handle it. It’s like they get some weird thing in their heads that acts out when these storms happen and then they snap a lot easier than they would. I once saw a guy that trashed his room because he kept hearing the thunder way after the storm was done. Kept saying ‘she’ was calling to him and that he had to go.”

“Who was calling?” Creepy stuff. “Go where?”

The old griffon shook her head with a defeated sigh. “Never managed to figure it out. He committed suicide less than a week later. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be filling your head with this. I just get frustrated that nobody listened to me when I was working. If the militia understood this stuff, they might be able to deal with it a lot better. Poor girl is probably gonna get sent to the psych ward in Shatteredrock.”

“No. I wanna know.” Not like the queue would be any faster if she didn’t… And it made her think of the things the old museum curator told her.

“It is usually associated with the storms and some sort of traumatic event. Well, I suppose that some drugs can trigger this, but they use the excuse because it exonerates them of the need for a proper investigation and the unicorns up top are fine because ‘some griffons are just dangerous’. Some deal better with the psychosis. Others… Well, they snap, and the militia has to contain them.”

“How the hell did she cut through militia armor with her bare claws because one of her screws got loose?”

The old griffon lady chuckled. “We don’t know the strength we have, girlie. Until we lose control, and our inhibitions are gone. The public loves to forget, particularly ponies, but there is a lot of magic involved with griffon paws and wings. We do walk on the clouds, after all.”

Gilda frowned. There was also some obscure law about sharp claws and whatnot. Like, griffons carried freaking cutting weapons with them all the time. Ponies freaked a little and the griffon government decided that sharp claws were to be classified as melee weapons for the purpose of law enforcement if they were kept sharp. Guess they were right. Crazy girl could’ve killed that militia just like that.

Maybe that ‘vision’ Gilda had with the desert was just her head doing weird things because of the storm. Come to think of it, maybe so was the whole ‘they’re out to get me’ thing and that old guy, Gabriel’s talk about going north.

Anyways, the line moved. All she had to do was wait. It looked like it was going to take some time, but she should get to the clerk before the end of the shift.

***

It took her three whole hours of perseverant dedication and patience, but she finally made it to the clerk. It was one of those glass windows on the wall with a space for her to talk to the other griffon on the other side and slide documents when needed. It was the white griffon with glasses that stood there. Next to him, a cute looking rose and yellow unicorn with a small bowtie for assistant. She sat behind the counter, so Gilda didn’t see her cutie mark.

“Greetings, ma’am. Thank you for your patience. Things are moving a bit slow today. You know… Even without the crazy… We apologize. She worked in cleaning for a few months and it seems to be some kid with issues. Anyways, how can I help you?”

“My house caught on fire this night. I need my insurance money to buy another.” She plainly stared at the pair.

“I see. I’m sorry. Name?”

“Gilda.”

“Do you have your ID, Gilda?” He Asked again. “Insurance papers, house scriptures…”

“Uh… I guess it got burned in the fire. But I know my ID number, if it helps.”

“It certainly does.” The unicorn said as she picked up a pencil and paper. “We’ll have to procure the rest with the city’s archives, and it should cost you a couple of days, but it shouldn’t stop the process.”

“It’s two-four-five, five-nine-five, thirty-nine dash four. Griffonstone.”

“Thank you.” She wrote it all down and started looking through a pile of papers while the griffon kept talking to her.

“Was there any passing away involved? Bodily injure? Pets? Money?” He asked all protocol. “Do you wish to declare that you caused the accident? Is there a related occurrence report with the Local Militia? Did you own the property? Was there any particular insured property within the property, such as family heirlooms, historical artifacts…

“Uh… No… No one died. I wasn’t home, I have no pets and no money.” She chuckled, trying to sound friendly, but she really was nervous. “I’m pretty sure I didn’t cause the accident and there shouldn’t be a report. But, yes, I owned the house, and I didn’t have anything else insured.”

“Well, then.” The griffon sounded pleased. “Standard procedures then.”

“I have the report, Gile. Arrived soon after the shift started.” The unicorn magicked it to the griffon. “She’s on probation and doing community service.”

Gilda blinked twice. “Is that a problem?”

Though she supposed she ought to be grateful to the firefighter that filed the report before going to sleep or something.

The griffon on the other side of the window adjusted his glasses and took a better look at the paper. “Not really. Bad stuff happens to griffons that are trying to do right too. Anyways, all it means is that your process will be under closer scrutiny than usual. In practical terms, it’s going to spend a few hours in a couple of extra desks. Let’s see… It seems you will be granted a pay of…”

He stared at the ceiling, certainly doing some quick mathematics. “Two-hundred thousand, three hundred something, something Bits. After taxes.”

Taxes… Of course. Regardless, Gilda tried not to show it, but that was a lot of money for her crappy little house. That was great! Her mom really got it right! She ought to remember that she also had the terrain.

“Well…” The griffon started writing on the form that was the paper the unicorn had given him. “Since it was an accident and likely outside of your capacity to avoid and you were working on community service, I think we can make it seem like you’re really trying hard and got some bad luck.”

“Yeah!” The unicorn agreed. “You should be getting the cheque in some two weeks. Tops. You just gotta come here in fourteen days and you’ll leave with it. Easy-peasy.”

“Will there be anything else, Miss Gilda?” Gile asked with a friendly smile.

“Not at all! Thanks a lot guys!” She smiled back and then left the window.

The old lady was next, and Gilda simply greeted her with a nod before heading out, but other than that, she simply walked the corridor on her way out a heck of a lot lighter than she felt before.

Walking out, even the sun seemed brighter, even if through the damn dark clouds. Then she saw the entrance to the hospital. The big griffon girl laid on a wheeled stretcher, on her side and tied to it, still unconscious. The militiagriffons were there. Two of them stood watch, their boss talked to what seemed to be a griffon doctor. The one that got injured probably was inside the hospital.

Part of her wanted to get close and try to help, or something. Maybe use the stand she stashed in the hospital as an excuse. But a more rational part convinced her that she was already in enough troubles and that she ought to avoid exposing herself too much. The right thing to do was going back to Greta and Gary’s house and staying put out of trouble before leaving for her job tomorrow. Who knew? Perhaps the big griffon lady would still be there, and she could get herself involved in helping, or at the least getting informed with Miss Goldina.

However, on her way, her thoughts were of the ‘psych ward in Shatteredrock’. She had only heard of the place and that it was in an island off the coast of Baltimare. Her imagination pictured a big rocky tower carved into a maximum-security prison where Celestia sent all the ‘evil griffons’. Maybe it was dumb, because she had never even seen a prison and the closest she’s ever got to something like that was the slammer in the local militia headquarters. But she never heard anyone speaking of Shatteredrock on good terms.

There was no way it was a pleasant place and the psychiatric ward on Shatteredrock ought to be the closest a living being would ever come to Tartarus.

Every single hair on her back and her feathers stood.

Well, there was nothing she could do. Even if she was working that day, there wasn’t much that she could actually do to help. The best she could do was remember that the girl would be on Goldina’s paws. She seemed to have a knack for helping problematic griffons.

In the end she should be happy that she didn’t have to skip a day in the job because she had to go see to her house’s insurance.


	6. Burning Cold

The walk to her temporary home was free of drama. At least until she actually arrived and stared at the door. In the moment she would pick up the key, it dawned on her that both Gary and Greta were still at work and she had no key to enter.

“Duh… Dumbass.” Her forehead hit the door. “Guess I’ll have to wait.”

She simply sat on the porch and tried to look as unfriendly as possible because she did not want _anyone_ asking her what she was doing there. And, of course, it happened within the first ten minutes.

One of those old griffon guys that had nothing to do with his time other than pestering the others walked up halfway the stone path to the porch. “Young lady, is there any reason you are sitting there?”

It was a dark brown old griffon with a white head wearing giant glasses and a gray beret that looked like he owned the street.

“My friends live here and I’m staying with them. My house caught fire.” She did her best to be friendly, but she must have failed because the sound of her own voice almost worried her.

“Oh! Is that so?” He didn’t even try either. “How come I have never seen you here then?”

“I had my own house. Until it caught fire. Now I’m sitting here. Waiting for them to come back from work. Because I don’t have the key.” She fumed but controlled her impulses to tell him where he should go.

“So, you don’t work…” He squinted at her. “Do you?”

Better to control herself. She didn’t want to go back to see Judge Gracie. Ever again. And for real… She learned her lesson about snapping at griffons.

“I asked you a question, young lady.” He glared from the distance.

“Sir…. I am not in my best of moods. Would you kindly leave me alone?” She fumed again. “I’m waiting for my friends to come home from work so that I can go inside!”

He hummed in an obnoxious and intentional way that almost made Gilda lose it. “I’ll be keeping an eye on you, young lady. I used to be on the Militia, you know? Don’t do anything dumb.”

She screamed inside. But at least he left her alone. And as time passed, she realized that, fortunately, he also didn’t bring the Local Militia, or something. Crazy old waste of griffon.

“Geez, calm down, Gilda.” She sighed and whispered to herself, rubbing her forehead. “It’s just some old guy that has nothing to do with himself after he retired. He probably thinks he’s helping.”

Yeah… Just sit there and wait. Avoiding all and problems that she might have attracted by wandering aimlessly. They shouldn’t take that long anyways.

Damnit, she was getting hungry. She ate a good breakfast, yes. But lunchtime was fast approaching, and she might be left outside for hours until Greta or Gary came home. Should have thought of that, dumbass.

Minutes passed and not only she was hungry and frustrated, but she was also bored. Leaned on her side against the door groaning to herself. She soon felt sleepy and keeping her eyes open was hard. Thank goodness she had her friends, because she really didn’t feel like going to one of the homeless shelters in the city, if they even worked anymore with that stupid war.

Yeah. She yawned. Greta and Gary were good friends. Heavy eyes closed slowly.

_You have no friends in that place, My Child._

Hell yeah, she did! Greta, Gary. She could even include Goldina and also the other nurses in the hospital. And that was without even mentioning Rainbow Dash! And she was sure she could even count Dad’s friends.

_When the war was over and the Dawnbringer crowned the Traitor King, My Children were hunted and cornered by mobs of cowards. It started as soon as she left, and the Traitor King turned a blind eye to them. In his eyes, My Children became a scapegoat to be sacrificed to a mob of frustrated peasants that needed vengeance. They hated My Children for your service to The Emperor, but above all they coveted your legendary beauty and feared the prowess I had given you._

Gilda should have settled awake. It felt as though there was another person in her head, talking to her. But she didn’t. Instead, the soft darkness became a dimly lit room. It smelled of moldy straw and the air was damp. It was hot and she was the oldest of the six griffon girls with her. The stories varied, but she was the only one that still had her enchanted sword. _Commandment_ she had called it the day she earned it, years ago.

The others were near defenseless, young, not fully trained, nor touched by The Harpy, without a real weapon. She borne the responsibility of protecting them.

A heavy thud roused her from her meditative slumber and elicited scared cries around her. Another followed and something crashed. Sunlight filtered through the poorly placed planks above and hot desert air filtered in.

“There she is! She’s the one!” A theatrically angry male accused in a language she didn’t recognize, but still understood the words.

“Where are they? Where?!” Heavy steps shook the planks above their heads as a coarse male voice accused.

“There is no one else here, sir.” A weak and scared female voice said.

_Those who surrendered were hanged in the central plazas of cities, much like the one where they build a statue to the Traitor King. Those who hid were hunted like animals. Loyal servants turned side as soon as their names were called as those who served The Emperor. Tax collectors and administrators saved their skins by sacrificing My Children. Most vile of treasons, yet those who followed the Traitor King spared the same ones that took their coin and oft their kin for tribute at the opportunity of torturing and murdering one of My Children. Those who provided any assistance were tried for treason and left to die in the desert._

“You’re lying!” The planks shook violently, and someone cried sharply at the sound of physical contact and collapsed to the floor above.

“You are animals!” The same female cried so hurtful. And then she cried again at the sharp sound of a slap.

“Take her to the plaza for judgement!” Another male barked. “And you find them! They are in here, somewhere!”

Heavy steps reverberated everywhere. Large objects were dragged on the floor above, several glass objects broke, and metals clanged above them as someone was dragged outside, screaming in fear.

Silently, with cold and calculated moves, she went from the center of the damp straw-covered room to the only dark wood door that led into it. There was nothing that could be moved into the way, so she became the only thing at the door. The others moved to the back of the room, as quickly as they dared, trying to not make a sound.

“Over here! This wall is false!” Someone laughed upstairs and several steps converged.

She stood on her hindlegs. Decades of discipline and training made one of the hardest things a quadrupedal creature could do trivial. Her right forepaw reached for the sword magically held in her back and she drew it. Her left forepaw held lower under the downward-swept hilt and she twisted her waist, raising her weapon and aiming the point forward. Faint yellow light emanated from the blade and lit its runes. Powerful spells moved magical energies and it vibrated and hummed as a furious lioness growling.

The stairs on the other side of the door creaked and someone tried it, but the rudimentary bolt locked it in place. She moved not a muscle.

“Nobody else, my ass…” Someone growled and chuckled on the other side. “Give me that hammer!”

A few seconds of silence passed before the door rattled with a bang and dust fell from it. One of her younger sisters whimpered behind her. The door rattled and banged again, fittings with the bolt became loose. The third time, splinters exploded from it and the metal fittings flew from the door. It opened wide and violently to show a smugly grinning griffon of medium height, dark green fur and white feathers with green highlights.

The last thing his blue eyes saw was the lusciously attractive female standing before him and the tip of her sword that pierced his left eye, his skull and his brain. Next to him, a laughing youth of similar colors, barely old enough to be called an adult, realized what had happened and his joyful expression turned to terror as she lunged then pulled the sword back and the momentum freed her blade of the older griffon to come down at his forehead, cracking open bone and cutting to the base of his skull, exposing blood-stained brain and a fountain of blood.

She pulled her blade free as, in the chaos of panicked peasants trying to distance themselves, one of them, a dumb-looking and fat green-gray griffon cried and fell down the stairs face-first into the straw in the floor. The tip of her sword cut the back of his neck and sent flying splinters of bone along with the blood in one clean swing.

One step back, the sword before her, she sidestepped a burly male of piss-yellow coat and a big white head charging forward with his pitchfork. Her sword sliced clean past his neck and then came down crashing past an improvised shield made of the bottom of a barrel and cut open the chest, flesh, bone and viscera, of a white and gray male that fell dead to the side before the head landed on the filthy straw.

A soldier jumped down the stairs. He wore a mesh armor covered in clear bronze squares above his blue coat and his white head was protected with an olive shaped bronze helmet. He stood to fight and had a proper shield and a short sword. He thrust his sword and she jumped back with a flap of her wings. He followed and predictably thrust again, but she spun past him, her sword cleaved through his exposed neck too and another head flew.

Something hit her back and she cried. Turned to see three of those dirty peasants spinning slings and wearing cheap leather armor. At her prime, she would have been able to summon the magical energies in her blood through her sword and rip them apart from a distance with magic alone. But things had changed, and her kind wasn’t as powerful as it once was. Still, she knew how to fight, and those peasants didn’t.

One of the clay bullets exploded on her blade when she intercepted it, the other missed and the third never let off his sling. With one mighty flap of her wings, she closed the distance faster than he could swear in panic and her sword stabbed him through the chest. Magical blade pierced through like he was naked and then she spun on her hindlegs, pulling her blade free to slash though the next one’s face.

In the middle of gurgling and bloody cries, she distanced herself a step from the door and a javelin somebody threw broke its tip in the hard dirt floor under the straw. The third peasant with the sling tried reaching for the javelin and she cut his paw off. He screamed at his cut off limb, but not for long: she slashed his throat open and sent him to the ground squirming in pain and panic.

There was some shouting and discussion in the top of the stairs while two more armored soldiers came into the room and promptly assumed a proper fighting stance.

“We’ll go easy on you if you drop that thing!” One of them said and the other distanced himself, as though she was some stupid commoner that didn’t know what she was doing.

She could imagine just how many homes filled with scared citizens of the Emperor's cities they sacked and how many scared kitties they raped every time Grover's rebels won a siege thanks to the help from that filthy equine! Their cruelty to captured Swordmaidens such as herself. They still wore the same armor they wore during the war. Grover still used them to keep cities safe and under control.

She wondered for a second if their paragon of justice, The Dawnbringer, approved of their ‘justice’, and she knew very well the fate that waited her and her sisters. But she would send as many of them as she could to the Scorch before they would lay their paws on her!

Her wrath fueled the sword’s magic and its magical gleam, and it scared them. They raised their spears and shields, but she moved too fast for them. She spun past the first’s spear even before the thrust and her momentum brought her sword hard on his head. Bronze was no match for magical energies and the steel from the imperial forges. The blade cut past bronze helmet, plumage, skin and bone. He fell, but the other rose his shield in time.

The bronze reinforced wood fared better, but his hand broke and he cried, falling back, against the wall. Before he knew the tip of her sword pressed in between the bronze squares of his armor. His brown eyes pleaded for mercy too late, her sword already pierced through to his heart.

Before he roared, she had felt his presence behind her. She pulled back her sword and it spun in her paws, cutting upward past his groin and spilling his intestines. Another filthy peasant, he dropped his hammer and cried in pain and terror, all the strength he thought he had gone. The other by his side hadn’t even noticed what happened and attacked her with a cleaver.

She sidestepped and spun past him slashing his body in half by the waist, spraying blood on the next commoners that meant to attack her, with a piercing cry and bringing her sword to bear on them.

One of them pissed himself and collapsed on his launches, dropping his rusty sword. The one to his side let off the bolt from his crossbow but she intercepted it with her sword, moving like lightning. He tried protecting himself with his weapon, but her enchanted sword broke past the questionable metal and wood and cut his skull in half with bone splinters and blood to the wall behind him.

In the same swing her sword cut open the other's neck before he even tried using his dagger. Another collapsed, crying as a panicked child and futilely grasping at his wound. The last cowered in the floor, next to the wall, covered in blood and urine.

“Mercy! Please!” He wailed as a waning cub, but she knew very well the kind of mercy to be had in that room and drove her blade through his heart.

“Drop that thing, you witch!” One of the peasants had grabbed one of her younger sisters and shielded himself with her, forcing her to sit in front of him, holding a knife to her neck.

Her name was Gharra, with green coat and white plumage on her head and her luscious fluffy chest. Lime on the tip of the feathers that made her crest, just like her eyes. She remembered teaching her sword drills and teaching her how to make a flower tea for her nerves when she prepared to meet the Emperor for the first time.

That filthy peasant wouldn’t ever understand and was surprised when her sword pierced thought her sister to his chest. He wouldn’t have them, and the others wouldn’t have Gharra.

_You fought like a beast. You painted the floor and the walls in their filthy traitorous blood. But it was never meant to be a fair combat and your fate was sealed._

From the top of the stairs, they threw bombs at her. They exploded with concussive force and threw her off-balance. Her senses dulled and a clay bullet exploded on her head. Clay dust and particles hurt her eyes and her head spun. One of her sisters cried, and before she could recover herself, strong paws grabbed her, and a heavy body threw her to the ground. She couldn’t see it, but something hard hit her head again.

When she came to herself again a big white and gray griffon held her to the straw on the floor. Spiteful gray eyes.

“We got you, fucking witch.” He gloated and spit fell on the feathers of her crest his heavy bronze and silk armor weighing on her. “Grab the others!”

_They made a game of raping you and your sisters, like unthinking brutes, unbothered by the filthy straw or even the blood of their brethren. When they grew weary of your abused bodies, they tied you to poles and made a spectacle of killing you by the entrance to the city._

They tied her forelegs to the top of a pole and her hindlegs to the base, at the top of a wooden platform. Strapped her wings closed, her body stretched and exposed. Six poles side by side by the entrance of the city, within her walls and before a crowd of angry griffons. Straw and logs at the base, covered in tar. The crowds screamed whoops and insults at the broken creatures at their mercy or obscene comments at their exposed teats and genitalia.

They threw rotten fruits and animal feces, but worse than the repulsive smells and the pain in her broken paws and sore body was the humiliation and the hopelessness before such a display of unbridled hatred over defenseless victims. Before the realization that her fellow griffons were reduced to animals by the hatred they projected into her and her sisters.

It justified all the things that she had done that led to that point and the only thing that she regretted was that the Emperor ultimately failed. Still, her loyalty remained, unfaltering even upon one of the worst deaths she could imagine and that she had never imposed on another.

Then a griffon came with a lit torch. One of her sisters cried at the sight. Barely an adult that had never laid in the Emperor’s bed. Never completed her training and never earned her sword, but she was one of them and that was all that mattered. She despaired and cried, wailed as a child would until her panic infected her sisters and they cried too.

A pony ran in front of the crowd. Gray in his luscious coat, with a white beard and mane from which poked his horn. Wore a blue cape and tall, pointed hat, both adorned with stars, moons and noisy little bells that conflicted abhorrently with the situation he found himself in.

“Stop this madness!” He cried, angry enough that his impetus surprised her, placing himself between the crowd, the executor and the stakes. “What lust for misfortune and suffering! It will not bring back the dead nor erase the abuses you suffered! Kindness will! There should be no place for this in the new world anymore, much less under King Grover’s crown, who fought against the Emperor, despite all the odds, so that you could live free! By mimicking it, you spit in the deaths of thousands of slaves that joined us and wanted nothing more than Grigor’s insanity to stop!”

Immediately someone cried in the middle of the throng. “They deserve worse! They murdered and tortured for the amusement of the Emperor!”

“They killed numberless of your own kind!” Another cried and the assembled griffons agreed noisily. “Why are you defending these monsters? They were Grigor’s whores, and his executioners!”

“Get that pony out of there!” Another faceless griffon in the crowd cried from the back and the ones in the front reached and dragged the old pony out of the way.

“King Grover will hear of this! Celestia will hear of this! Barbarians! All of you!” He cried, but no one paid attention, much less when they dragged him away.

None of the six prisoners begged for mercy, nevertheless. Even if there was any to be had, they would not want it. Even the youngest among them understood. They could despair and cry but would not beg.

Still, the mob laughed, and laughed. And laughed while the pony begged for some common sense. Like braying mules, they celebrated torturing Her Chosen and they forgot themselves Her words.

With what energy her body still managed to conjure the wind to cry above them and all the pain she endured, she cried. “The Wheel of Time spins unstopping and he who finds himself in power will find that he is thus powerless! Under the Sun and Moon you have forgotten the harsh mountain where She has birthed your ancestors and hoofed blood runs in your veins!”

They booed and others laughed louder yet, the pony silenced, however and she could see the dejection in his eyes. The executioner laughed and carried on this task with cruel delight, walking in front of them and letting the flames touch the straw and tar. They caught on almost immediately and spread over the dark liquid, quickly rising and reaching at their limbs.

Wailing cries and sorrowful bawls overcame the laughter with the stench of burned fur while the condemned squirmed and fought helplessly against their restraints. The torment of the flames that scorched the fur in her coat and burned into her muscles which pulled tendons, became one with the smell of her flesh under the searing heat.

_The fire in your veins burned hotter than the flames that licked at your skin and lighted your wrath in sublime desire for revenge. You roared louder and fiercer than the flames._

“You followed the Traitor King and you forsworn the mighty for the meek in their promises of ease. You regale yourselves with their softness and you give in to their pliant beds! You follow leaders fat from their disgusting food and you pay them in the coins with the Dawnbringer’s face. You listen to her soothing words and you share in her children’s drinks.”

_They did not silence, but neither did you. Their laughter tainted in apprehension; your words drenched in fury, a ravenous hunger for vengeance that burned you more than the scorching heat._

Laughter diminished and she sworn payback worse than any capital punishment that they could ever have submitted her to.

“The Wheel of Time will spin unstopping and you will regret and cover yourselves in the ashes of birch trees. Sacrifice me and my sisters under Her sun and I will feast in the Stormy Eyrie, but when the Predator stalks the world again, you will share in their fear and I will rejoice, a captain of Her faithful at Allmother’s side!”

_I held your heart in the cool rain from the mountains where your race was born and distanced the agony of the flames. A final gift, for my faithful chosen that never wavered. Your body expired to the fumes and burned away to the flames, but your soul remained cold as the Stormy Eyrie where I gave rise to your proud race._

_Countless others before you, innumerable after you._

_And they dared call us savages. The ones the Traitor King said were tired of subjugation. The ones that allied themselves to the Dawnbringer. The ones that united the entire world against us. Yet, none came to your assistance when they used your body and burned you alive. Even in our grim defeat, I was the only one that heard your cries._

_And here we are now, and I beckon you to me, for it is at my side that you belong, to guide your race into a new Empire and bring reckoning upon those that had forsaken us. For not even several lifetimes and deaths erased the torment they inflicted upon you for serving My Favored Son._

Not Greta or Gary. They would never hurt her.

“Gilda?” She startled awake at the mention of her name and Greta’s paw recoiled. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to startle you! You look… Are you okay?”

Her friend, next to her, carried a box on her back had her saddlebags filled with stuff. She blinked, all worry. “Are… Are you sure you’re alright? Gilda?

“Ah, it was nothing…” Gilda shrugged off her concern with a gesture. “I was just having a dream. That is all. And uh… Waiting for you to open the door.”

She grinned and moved out of the way, trying not to look too awkward while waiting for Greta to open the door, despite the residual sensations from her dream that intruded on her mind.

“Goodness!” Her friend gasped. “I’m sorry Gilda! I forgot you’d be locked outside!”

She waited while Greta took care of the lock. “Ah, it’s okay. I’m cool.”

What the hell was that?! That… That wasn’t normal! Like someone was putting thoughts into her head! Memories rushed back at the mere recollection of that dream. Vision. Whatever in the freaking heck that was! The smell of smoke intruded on the smells of grass and Greta’s perfume.

The screams and their laugher haunted her thoughts, the smell of sweat and his weight. Every pain and sensation. She took her paws to her beak and breathed in with a whimper.

Greta stared at her, all concern again. “Are you sure you’re okay? Did something go wrong in the Insurances Office? Gilda?”

She shook her head, but her eyes stung. Wetness slipped down her face. She spoke the best she could through a lump in her throat and a sob and whipped it as fast and discreet as she could. “I’m okay. I… Ah. I just need some water. That is all.”

That was messed up! She had got to see Goldina and get a doctor tomorrow!

When Greta finally opened the door, she followed inside and did her best not to seem too distressed, making her way to the bathroom in the corridor and locking the door. Her reflection in the mirror showed nothing, but she smelled it. She felt it. Her coat dirty and disgusting. Fortunately, Greta’s house had a shower, one of those fancy magical showers that even heated the water. Not that she cared about it, she only wanted the water and the soap.

It took her several rinsings and almost an hour before she finally got her nerves and sobbing under control and calmed down. The warm water helped, and so did the soft aroma of roses the soap left on her body. But most of all the running water across her fur and feathers while she supported herself on the wall and let it shower on her head downward.

Someone knocked at the door and she startled. “Gilda? Do you need anything?”

“Uh… No. Thanks… Uh… I… I’ll get out in a minute.” She grimaced at her own broken voice.

“Alright. Uh… See you soon, then.”

Poor Greta. She worried for her. It felt nice, but it also made her feel like a weight. She shouldn’t make her wait too much. Hopefully, those freak visions, or hallucinations… Or whatever the heck they were, would be gone once the thunderstorm was done.

She grabbed a towel and dried herself off, but she couldn’t keep her mind from wandering, and speaking of worrying, she hoped Greta and Grizelda were okay. And that big girl from the insurance office too. Somehow, she doubted, though. Maybe she was just on edge.

_You know very well what you saw._

Gilda held her beak again. She knew. That was her. Somehow. Fuck knew where, centuries ago, after the war King Grover and Celestia won to dethrone the Emperor. Except, that wasn’t the story that she was taught! She didn’t even know how to process that information.

But she was calmer and didn’t feel dirty anymore. She couldn’t let Greta waiting forever either.

Once she was done and walked out the bathroom, Greta waited for her with some food. A pinkish juice, a large and short pie with slices already cut and served at two plates. And Greta next to the table in the dinning room. Sitting and with her paws by her chest, smiling though her eyes were as heavy with worry, as her voice.

“I got some pie for us. Hum. Milk jam pie from Manehattan and also some guava juice! If you feel like it… And, and… How about a game?”

Gilda smiled. She really didn’t deserve Greta.

***

That was some of the most fun Gilda had in months. A simple card game with important creatures from the present and past. She didn’t know how she’d feel if her semblance was in a card game but seeing Rainbow Dash trumped by Spitfire in intelligence made her giggle.

She also saw the pony from her dream but pretended she didn’t recognize him.

The pie was one of the most delicious things she’d ever eaten. That thing certainly had been transferred via teleporter because that was the only way that thing got to Griffonstone, across the ocean. It must have costed a ridiculous amount of money.

Part of her resented the fact that Greta had it so easy. She made her own money working with things she liked, while Gilda’s stupid scones barely kept her afloat when that whole mess of war began. She supposed that rather than felling entitled like a child she ought to be happy her friend shared that with her. Not to mention that Gary was a public servant and had his salary guaranteed no matter what.

So, yeah… It was Gilda’s own fault she didn’t go to college and didn’t have any great skill sets like Dashie. Guess it was nice being a pony and being born with a set of skills one could turn into a job.

_You were born a predator. A hunter. You still remember the smell of blood, talons tearing into flesh and the terror in their large eyes._

In reality, she supposed, there were no jobs the ponies could find that would not make her too dangerous.

_The thing they fear the most is your occupation. You excelled at taking lives. One of those closest to the Emperor. One of his favorites, and one of My Chosen. You are wasting your time and you are waited in the ancient home of your race. There is nothing for you among the hooflickers anymore._

Gilda coughed and grinned at Greta while the other carefully examined the cards in her paws. “When does Gary come home?”

“Oh…” She replied absentmindedly, with a mischievous grin at her cards. “Sometimes he has to work late. Especially with these thunderstorms. Things go kinda crazy. A-ha!”

She slapped her Fluttershy card on the table. “I’m going for Kindness!”

Yeah… That should be cheating… She scanned her cards and that was probably a lost round. The best she had was an Ocellus. The fuck was an Ocellus anyways?

Then the door opened, and Gary came inside with a large basket on his back. “Oh! Hi Gilda! Hi, Greta.”

“Hi! Welcome home!” Greta ginned while Gilda got up from her seat.

“Let me help.” She grabbed the basket from his back, and it smelled awfully of blood. Like a lightning bolt shot through her body and she just stared at it, hopefully not too awkwardly when she noticed it. “What is in here?”

“I bought a whole chicken from the market. Since we have a guest.” He chuckled. “I suppose that we should do something special.”

“Great idea!” Greta squealed and took the basket from Gilda. “Let’s get it ready for dinner! The we can eat the rest of the pie for dessert and play games the whole night!”

Gary chuckled again. “Calm down, Greta. We have to go to work tomorrow morning. Including Gilda.”

“Ah… We’ll work something out!” She insisted in her cheerfulness.

***

At least Gilda knew her way around the kitchen and actually helped. The three of them got the chicken seasoned, and it wasn’t ideal, but they didn’t want to wait until lunch next day to eat it. Yet, it didn’t matter because it tasted amazing anyway. Gilda refrained from eating too much, though. Too conscious of just how expensive that thing must have been. Greta talked without stop. Probably because of the wine. Yeah. Another hecking expensive stuff they showered her with, and she wouldn’t be able to afford it for herself.

She couldn’t help feeling just a little jealous that they managed to make a nice living for them, and both worked with what they liked. Stupid war. Stupid Chancellor.

_Your place is with royalty, My Child. Return to me and your life will be fulfilled._

“Ah…” Greta finally stopped talking about the recent trends in perfumes. “I’m gonna go get that pie for us!”

She stood and walked off, cheerfully murmuring a little song to herself and Gary smiled at Gilda. “How did things go in the insurance office?”

“Pretty well, actually!” She grinned. “They said my case gotta be reviewed, but they also said I’ll get a good amount of cash. Soon!”

“Oh! That’s great!” He grinned too. “Er. Not that I want you to leave. It’s just… I’m glad! Already talked to my boss and said you were cool and got a bit unlucky. He was fine with it going through in a hurry. We got bigger fish to fry, you know!”

“Sounds great! Thanks Gary!” She grinned, and right at the same time Greta called for some help from the kitchen. Since Gilda was the guest, he gestured for her to stay and went himself. In fact, he stood before she could volunteer to help, and so, she simply waited at the table for the two of them to return, which didn’t take long. He brought the plates and small dessert forks while she brought that pie from the afternoon.

“We should do something fun!” Greta chirped after they were served their slices. “Why don’t you tell us about the job you got, Gilda?”

“That is not fun, Greta…” Gary deadpanned at her so hard Gilda had to laugh.

“Of course, it is!” She insisted. “Gilda is gonna do great in anything. She’s so independent and clever!”

Wow. That was so awkward. “Uh… I don’t know about that, Greta. I mean… I’m kinda like a nurse, but not really. I mostly clean and change wounds that aren’t too complicated. I don’t help the doctors or anything. But I am thinking about going to nurse school after this is all done. I mean… My boss, Miss Goldina, is great.”

“Well, cleaning wounds and changing dressings is important too, right?” Greta grinned. “The important thing is that you’re doing your best. It’s a shame that dumb judge won’t see that it wasn’t your fault!”

“Well, it kinda was.” Gilda’s fingers drummed at the edge of the table. “I mean… You’re not supposed to punch griffons even if you are right.”

“I guess so.” Greta frowned a little and stared at Gary. “But don’t you think that it is wrong that she is being punished when she was just struggling and protecting her income?”

“Oh! Yeah! Sure! I mean, Gilda was more of a victim than anything.” He shrugged. “But I guess we have laws that protect minors for a reason.”

“See?” Then she gave Gilda a lewd grin. “Hey! Any hot guys working there?”

“Greta!” Garry cried.

“What? It’s a legitimate question!” She pouted. “I mean… Nurses, right?”

“Well, I worked on this hot guy from the Thunderpeak Militia…” Gilda grinned back, winking.

“Oooooh! Details!” She jumped on her seat.

“Do you girls need me to walk outside for a while?” He teased them, pointing a thumb at the door.

Gilda laughed more to herself. Geez. Talk about the wine going up to their heads.

Someone knocked at the door, and Gilda didn’t pay much attention to it since Gary stood and didn’t even say anything. He closed the door, going outside to talk to someone while the two of them kept talking about Gilda’s job. Mostly about the big guy from Thunderpeak.

It didn’t take long for Gary to return and he didn’t look very happy.

“Who was it, Gary?” Greta giggled, all cheery.

“Ah… It was nothing.” Something was definitively wrong. He just sat back in his place and gave them the most nervous and insincere grin she had ever seen. But maybe Gilda was on edge because Greta didn’t seem to notice it.

The conversation didn’t last much longer anyways. They all needed to sleep.


End file.
